


[Erehisu] Queen Bee

by DarknessLantern



Category: Shingeki no Kyojin | Attack on Titan, 進撃の巨人 | Shingeki no Kyojin | Attack on Titan (Movies), 進撃！巨人中学校 | Shingeki! Kyojin Chuugakkou | Attack on Titan: Junior High
Genre: Badass Krista Lenz | Historia Reiss, College Student Eren Yeager, Erehisu, ErenxHistoria, F/M, Mental Health Issues, POV Eren Yeager, POV Krista Lenz | Historia Reiss, Royal Krista Lenz | Historia Reiss, Top Eren Yeager
Language: English
Status: In-Progress
Published: 2020-09-18
Updated: 2021-02-09
Packaged: 2021-03-07 19:14:03
Rating: Mature
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 17
Words: 58,541
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/26522734
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/DarknessLantern/pseuds/DarknessLantern
Summary: " you helped me" I said. " You found me..."" I'll go with you." Eren says " I'll go wherever the world leads us..."
Relationships: Krista Lenz | Historia Reiss & Eren Yeager, Krista Lenz | Historia Reiss/Eren Yeager, Mikasa Ackerman & Jean Kirstein, Mikasa Ackerman/Jean Kirstein, Reiner Braun/Krista Lenz | Historia Reiss
Comments: 5
Kudos: 63





	1. The Queen and her Prey

**Author's Note:**

> Hello everyone! I'de like to thank everyone for reading this fanfic <3 every single one of you really makes me happy :)). This is a work of fiction. A fiction dedicated to my dearly love ship "Erehisu." My younger self decided to make this fic back in 2018. My little shippy brain imagines a lot of things about them until I came up to this fanfic lol. This fic was actually inspired by one of isayama's works which were the high school fake previews. Well of course with a little twist of mine （＾ν＾)

"Can you say something that I don't know yet..." I said

She clutched her hands together. Avoiding eye contact with me.

In a heavy, cold, night. We were standing in the middle of the road. Where the lamppost shines its light. Flickering at every second. I knew that she was nervous. She was expecting something about me. So I walked closer to her. Grabbing her cold sweaty hands. She rushed her eyes up to me. I could feel her heartbeat beating faster and faster.

" I feel strange lately..." she says softly "Probably because of your homemade soup that you made it for me. That was disgusting." She changed the atmosphere.

"What?" I let out a soft chuckle "seriously? I thought you liked it..."

She shook her head " not anymore" she looks up to me and forcing herself not to laugh out loud in this dark area.

"C'mon..." a groan in the middle of the word "just tell me already..."

She pauses and looks at me for seconds. Crossing her arms to her chest. Looking at me from my feet up to my face. "You look disgusting"

"Well, I was AARGH—"

She kicks my right leg. The pain stings that reach up to my brain "fuck.."

"That's my payback..." she sticks her tongue out.

Love can be complicated sometimes. You can't expect love. You can't control love. Only love controls you and a lot of time is needed. We don't know when we'll meet our true love. Sometimes love can be hatred. Sometimes love can be loved. Love can change people. Love can change everything. And here I am. I was changed because of love.

And because of her.

~~~~~

Every time day comes I always knew that today will be another same day as yesterday. Same routine, same schedule, and clothes, same time as always. I wake up at 8:00 am. When I wake up I would stay first in the bed and stare at the ceiling. It helps me a lot when I start another day. After that, I would get up and finally starting a new day.

I would always arrive at school at 8:45 am. Yes, I know and I am already late. I'm always late and I'm always get scolded by my history teacher Mr. Smith. I'm used to his eyes whenever I come late. His eyes were ready to kill me indirectly. Of course, there's a punishment. A punishment where I would stand at the back for the whole period. Yep, the same day as yesterday.

I'm a new student. At first, I was expecting that it would very easy that I have to start again from the beginning. New school, the new life that's what they used to say. The first day of school was the hardest. I feel heavy in my chest and my legs wanted to walk to the exit. It was extremely awkward. Meeting new neighbors, new people, new classmates, and a new atmosphere. Sometimes, you need to adjust yourself to connect with other people.

But right now, I feel that I'm empty like a nobody. I feel like I was just a ghost roaming around this university. I wasn't part of anything. I was just a regular person that has no dreams and ambitions in life. I don't care to be honest.

The morning class was over. I was sitting outside by the entrance. Sitting on the bench as I watched the other kids doing their thing.

It's been days since the school started. And I have discovered a lot of things.

"Oh oh!!! Oh oh oh!! A butterfly!! C'mon Connie let's catch it!!"

" Sasha!! Just wait for a sec!! Hey!!!"

Sasha. Known as the "Floater". Yeah, she's weird. I caught her once that she was talking to herself. And making faces by the glass window that everyone was trying their best to ignore her. She also likes to steal food from others. That's why I would go to the restroom and eat my snacks there. All alone.

And the other one was Connie. "The slacker" I wasn't able to know a lot about him. We never talk. Not even once. As far as I know, he's the type of guy who likes to be with Sasha. They're practically best friends. Best friends that like to do weird stuff together. Ahem.

" I told you! The manga is way better than the anime!!"

" Marco!! The anime is way better! Comics in black and white? You call that 'better'?" He does the apostrophe gesture by his fingers.

Armin. The PC-obsessed anime lover also known as the "Geek" with his buddy Marco. The Homework-obsessed nerd is known as the "Brain" who likes to read books. There were the most genius people here at the University. I talked to them once but all that they have been talking about was anime and other stuff. I'm not really into that. I am practically out of this place.

"Psst hey..." someone whispered at my back. Her breath hissed at the back of my neck. I scratch it with my fingernails as I look back. " ah.. Mikasa..?"

She smiles with her eyes closed. Like a small doll face. Her pale white skin and rosy red lips make her look really like a living doll " yeah you call me right" she says. " Now stop looking at me!" She whispers and shouts at the same time. She moved my shoulders facing in front. Her grip made me think that this girl is strong.

" what are you hiding for—"

"SHH!" She aggressively says as I heard her necklace tingles as she moves " he'll spot us if keep doing that."

"Who..?" I softly say, without looking at her.

"That horse face bastard."

Ah... She meant Jean. The bad boy. The big bully. He was now walking along the pathway. With his hands on his pockets. His hair would always shine against the sunlight because of too much hairspray. His hair must be hard as a rock by now. He suddenly kicks the book that Marco was holding. And Armin stood up and shouts something at him.

"Damn..." I commented

"I know..." Mikasa whispers back. " I must make a curse that would make that guy away from us. He freaks me out every time he seeks up to me. I hate it."

Mikasa. The occult lover. The only Goth in this University. She's the only person that I spent the time most. She would always tell me the curses and mythology and some dark ages and stuff. She's been always with Armin and Marco after dismissal. And I would always be left out all alone. But at least I have the person to talk to.

"Uh... excuse me?" The voice sounds annoyingly disturbing. I suddenly look back and saw her.

Ahh... it's Hitch. The "Wannabe".

"You're new here, right?" She's talking to me " and you too Mikasa. Why the fuck you sitting there? That's gross." She says with her arms crossed.

Mikasa stands up without saying any other word. She walks up to me hiding at my back. What is this girl up to? I know that I'm a new student here just why the fuck is she acting this way? Disgusting. " what do you want from us?" I said boldly " why can't you just leave us alone."

"Oh... my... god..." she says softly at every other word. " who do you think you are, huh? Some upper-class school castes? Just look at you. You look like a helpless rat" she kicks the leg of the bench that made me stumble backward. " and lastly, you're violating the rules. Look at where you are sitting."

I blinked for seconds. I have no idea what she was talking about.

"Huh, by the looks of your eyes you don't know anything." She pauses " That's the 'Queen Bee's spot so get the fuck off—" she pushes me off the bench as I immediately remove her hand from my shoulder.

Hitch. I saw her every time with her boyfriend Marlowe the "Preps". Whenever classes are over, I spotted them at the back of the library. The place where they make out. Even my schoolmates were trying their best to ignore them. Even though how many sounds they make, even though it's very uncomfortable, they're going to stay still and stare at the book. And that's the start where Armin and Marco didn't go to the library anymore. Eugh. Who does that?

Mikasa grabs my arm pulling me away from her " maybe we should leave. She's coming anyway..." by her voice, I could tell that she's terrified. By whom? By Hitch? She acts like she's the bottom of everything and Hitch is way higher than us.

"Queen bee..." I said softly, trying to remember what Hitch just said. " who's Queen Bee?" I've never heard that name before.

We stopped by the shade under the tree. Armin was there as well as Marco. We sat beside them as they gave us a 'hi' look. And without noticing, Mikasa was ignoring my question.

"Hey, guys! What's up? What you guys bring you here?" Armin says with a friendly voice.

" That Hitch threw us away. Such a salty brat..." Mikasa's voice became acid when she said her name. " I'm going to curse her" she mumbles, avoid eye contact with us. "Besides they're coming anyway."

"T-they're?" I repeated as I inch closer to Mikasa. Willing to know more. " what are guys talking about?" I look back to Armin and Marco with a feared emotion sticking to their faces. "G-guys..?" They haven't said anything. Marco hugged his knees together as Armin does an Indian seat looking down to the ground. I gaze back to Mikasa who's her back leaning to the trunk of the tree, hugging her knees as she puts her chin over it. They all went silent.

There's a group of people walking down to the entrance. Looking confident as if everyone was praising them. People around them start to cheer and some of them were running away. They were looking like they're the god and goddesses in this school. Even Hitch is included also as Marlowe who's running down to meet with the others. Their faces seem unfamiliar to me. I haven't met them before. " who are they..?" I asked Mikasa who is still looking at them.

"Hmph..." She says softly " they belong to the higher school castes. And we were the bottoms. We're known as the losers."

"She's right." Armin said as I gaze back to him " We were supposed to avoid them or else they're doing to do something horrible to us."

"Bullying..." Marco suddenly says "Bullying is very common here. And we're the targets..."

This feels not right. "And you're okay with it?" I asked them, by looking at them one by one "you're all fine with it?"

"We've been here for several years now." Mikasa says " so... What's the big deal? We're already used to it. Besides we're not that fragile. And technically, we're not usually get bullied that easily... Well..." She raises her shoulders " sometimes I guess. And remember" her eyes focused to mine " I'm a Goth and they fear me..."

" Stop being an actor Mikasa..." Jean just appeared. As I felt the jolt coming from Mikasa as she heard her name. Jean sits beside her as he put his hand around her waist as he pulls her closer to him. I can see the "uncomfortable" look from her. She wanted to stay away from him and hide somewhere else.

"What did you just say hmm, darling?" He says slowly in a deep voice " I'm a Goth and they fear me..?" He laughs as he traces his fingers along her chin up to her bottom lip. " you're not quite that brave sometimes, Mikasa. Thank me because without me here with you, you'll be in trouble by now." His face gets closer as he sniffs her neck " Ghad you smell so good..."

"Jean, cut it out," I said in a tough voice. My body was tensing up seeing Mikasa trying herself to get away from him. And her eyes asking for help. She couldn't defend herself. She can't do anything. Now I get it. She's right. We're the losers and losers were supposed to express the admiration of those who were the upper class. And I know jean was one of them. Jean. The bad boy. The big bully.

"Hey hey, Jeager-boy? Am I right?" He says, pointing his hand at me by making a gun.

I didn't respond.

"Hey hey..." He says, willing to have a normal conversation with us. " I was just spying the four of you earlier and I have heard you..." he points his hand at the group of people who walked down the entrance earlier " you don't know them..?"

"Yet.," I said immediately.

He clears his throat. Fixing his hair even though there isn't have any strand falling off. He looks back at me and clears his throat again. " let's have a lesson shall we?" He says as he stands up letting go of Mikasa. He walks up in front looking like a professor. " Let's start with..." He looks back and gazing his eyes to the group one by one. Once he's finished he said " Reiner. 'The Jock'. Also known as the 'School's King". He said walking back and forth with his hands' clasps together  
" He's technically the highest among the other school castes. And he's the most popular guy here at the University. Every girl has a crush on him. Well, Except Mikasa because I know she loves me am I right?" He winks at her.

" I'm not you dumbass" I heard her mumble beside me.

"Dammit. I wish I was him. Anyway... Back to the lesson." He puts his hand into a ball over his mouth as he clears his throat. "Next is Bertolt. The "Messenger". He may seem to look innocent but he isn't." He slowly kneels keeping his eyes on me. His voice becomes soft. Making it a secret between us. " whoever makes fun of his "king" Reiner he'll sure tell him immediately. You don't even know how much Reiner gets rage in anger. Imagine that so be careful"

Hearing those words is making me think that there is always will have a villain wherever you go. It could be your friends, your family, and even the people that were always around you. They may be looking so nice on the outside but you may not know what's their being on the inside. Fake. I call it fake persons. Fake friends. Sometimes, that's the reason why I have trust issues.

" That's it?" I said, looking back to see who's left. "How about the—"

"Ymir? Hmm, Ymir. The "Pleaser" I don't know much about her. All I know is that she's been always with that girl." Jean says.

"That girl..?" I question.

"The Queen bee." Armin suddenly says without even looking at us.

"Hah!" Jean was impressed I can tell. " look who's talking. It's the nerdy-boy" He slightly pushed him on his forearm. Making a friendly move.

" We never know her name." Armin slowly looks at me

" what?" Am I hearing that right? " wait what? You don't?"

" He's right." Marco said beside him " Surprisingly, she's the most popular girl. And... By the looks of her..." His eyes looked in front as I follow his gaze.

There's Reiner the "Jock" Bertolt the "Messenger" and Ymir the "Pleaser" and the person who is left is the "Queen Bee". She was sitting on the bench where I was sitting before. She crosses her legs moving her foot up and down repeatedly. She's wearing a cheerleader uniform. Her hair was a golden blonde that reaches down below her shoulders. She's looking at her phone on her hands while Ymir was beside her. Discussing something that she wasn't paying attention to. She's—

" She's quite bored." Marco says " well, most of the time"

"Everybody's dream girl..." Jean softly says as he noticed me looking " you know why?" His voice sounds more like a whisper " she's crazy rich. Like so crazy." He adjusted himself since he's only half-sitting towards the ground " there's even a rumor that her dad was a drug dealer." He pauses. Looks at me for a second and smirks

" Who knows... It could be true or not but for me, she's more like a mysterious girl..."

~~~~~

A " mysterious girl" huh? I've been thinking about it until now. It's Saturday afternoon and I have no idea what to do. I'm just laying over my bed staring at the ceiling as I have earphones plugged on. Listening to some music by "Khai dreams". His songs were my favorite.

I've been living with all by myself in this very small apartment. Just one single bed with a single shower room. There's no kitchen but there's a big glass window by the terrace. Since I don't have any kitchen or even a refrigerator, I would buy some instant noodles. That is my meal for a whole month now.

There's a sound of a small click by the door. The mail just got in. I get up and start to compile them. Just some bills. And bills. And other bills. And the other one. Fuck. I don't have enough money.

And there's a letter from my mom.

My mom was working abroad as a janitress. We've never talked for almost a few months now. I miss her a lot. I miss her homemade dish that she would always prepare for me. I stared at the envelope for a moment as I slowly open it carefully.

My beloved Eren,

Sorry, it's been so late since I made you one. But there's good news. My boss gave me an extra allowance. I hope that's enough for you. Be a good boy always alright? Your mom misses you a lot. I promise I'll get back very soon. Love you son. Study well...

Love,  
Your mom.

I smiled at her sweet words and I felt her embrace against mine. Without realizing there's a tear spot ar the corner of my eyes. I wiped it away immediately. Even though she wasn't around, I could feel her warmth and even her voice as I read the letter. I do. I do miss my mom.

There's my allowance attached to the letter. I would collect them in a clear jar. I use them to pay for my tuition fees. Yeah, the school that I was studying right now was a little bit expensive so I need to earn a lot. The 1/4 of the allowance will be for my survival needs and the others will be put in the clear jar.

How am I going to pay all the bills? Well, somehow I ended up working as a cashier at Seven-Eleven. For the whole night. My night shift. That's why I'm always late. Like the whole time.

My shift will start at noon. And ends at 6:00 am. If the classes starts at 8:00 am to 5:00 pm. I have 7 hours of sleep before I get into my job. Yep. That's my life. My dark circles under my eyes start to appear now which is great. Sigh.

It's currently 1:00 am at seven eleven. Customers often go here at this time. So I patiently sit down by the counter. Read some magazines and eat more instant noodles. And more Slurpees cause why not. I'm in heaven right now, A lot of food is around me.

I find it very suspicious. When the clock ticks at exactly 3:03 in the morning, she would come. Yes. I meant the "Queen Bee" at school. The mysterious girl that everyone talks about. But every time she comes, she would buy some snacks. Just some ordinary snacks. Sometimes she would come in pajamas on like she doesn't even care what she was wearing.

She would slam the box of pocky against the counter and wasn't paying attention to anything. She's always on her phone. She would walk by the aisle without even looking. Looking like a robot that has memorized the directions.

As I patch the pocky, I said " that would be—"

Without me finishing my sentence she cut me off by slamming the bill. Not even looking at me. " keep the change" she said immediately. And then she left the convenience store with her box of pocky.

When the other night comes, she came again. As always with her phone attached to her eyes. Grabs several bags of chips and slam it again against the counter. She didn't look at me even once. I think she doesn't know me or even recognizes me or maybe she doesn't know that I was her schoolmate.

" that would be 30.2—"

Then gives me a 100 bill. " Keep the change..." She says leaving the convenience store with her chips again. That repeats again and again for a few weeks now. sometimes I don't have to say the amount anymore. She would place the money and be done. She'll leave the store and come again tomorrow night.

One night came and it is already 3:30 in the morning. And I guess this is the first time she wouldn't come. It feels very different. So I sat down from my seat, leaning against the wall and tries myself to have a small nap. Just a nap. So I closed my eyes and—

A sound of the bang object against the counter, which is something heavy that I made myself jumped in horror. I thought it was a criminal but... it was something else. It was her again.

Thank god. This time she wasn't holding her phone. Her hair was tied up into a messy bun and it looks like she's wearing an oversized white shirt, exposing her whitish legs.

"How much?" She says neutrally. Her eyes look so tired. Until I didn't realize that a bottle of liquor was standing on the counter.

"how much?" She repeats but this time in a rising tone.

Her voice scares me " I'm sorry ma'am... this liquor will only be bought if someone was 18 and above. And we require personal identification to make sure of the age." I sound so uncomfortable

" Are you saying that because of my height?" She asks in a fast tone. " I'm calling my dad"

"B-but ma'am, we're—"

" OP OP OP" she put out her pointer finger at me. Her eyebrows were pressed together as she pouted her mouth. " Shut up"

So I standstill. My back aches from standing so straight. I swallowed air. And my throat feels dry. This girl was something else I thought. Is this person even a drinker? why would she buy liquor at this time? It's 4:00 in the morning.

She puts out her phone and pressing the keyboard as fast as the wind. Then, she puts her phone on her hear. She waits and she responds. " dad. I can't buy the liquor that you asked me to bring" she says eye contacting at me. I swallowed. "Ahuh... yeah yeah. Hm-mm. alright."

She puts her phone before me as she taps the loudspeaker button. She whispers "explain everything to him.."

I made a small nod " Good evening sir. I am very sorry. This store doesn't allow 18 and below to buy the liquor. It also requires a personal identification card to make sure of the age." I just said the same earlier.

" I am his Father. And I asked her a favor if she could buy me the liquor. I am 18 plus years old." Then looked at her. She was smirking, proving that she was right.

" Uhm, sir. As I said, sir. The only ones who can buy the liquor of whose age has 18 and above. You can come here and we can clarify your identification card—"

"Hey, you cashier boy." She suddenly snaps out "I'm not here to wait. Let me just pay this okay? So I can go home now."

"I'm sorry." I feel like I'm the one who's the victim " I'm just doing my job—"

She cuts me off as she suddenly puts several papers bills on the counter and brings out the liquor with her. " hey hey!!" I shouted. I ran after her. Suddenly I bang myself by the metal small opening door blocking my way. With my sweaty hands, it gets stuck so a jump up and runs after her.

I stand still outside by the sliding door. My breathing gets shallow as I realized how tiring it was to jump. The sun starting to rise where she was nowhere to be found. " fuck..." 

~~~~~

Monday. My worst day in a week. A new day for starting a new class. How great is that? Lunchtime in the cafeteria was quite busy. There's a lot of people talking and mumbling and clattering of plates around. And today was different. Usually, I'm with all by myself. But this time Mikasa is with me. She was sitting beside me. Also, there's Armin. He was here but he was taking a line to get some lunch. And Marco. He's absent.

I haven't told them about Queen bee. Where she would always come very late at night. Also about what happened last night. Surely, there's a lot of cameras around in that store. I'm sure they captured her face. And I'm going in a big trouble. With that simple act of hers, my manager will be so upset at me. I knew it. I can already sense it.

" Hey..."

Without noticing. Mikasa just shook my arm. I looked at her. " hm?"

" you're daydreaming. What's wrong? You didn't even have at least one bite to your food."

Mikasa has a motherly thing behavior. Sometimes she kinda reminds me of my mom. " Ah—" I jolted back to my food as I take a spoon. " I'm sorry..."

" it's okay" She softly laughs " At least the demons didn't catch you" typical Goth Mikasa.

I hum in response. As a took a bite. Chew the beefsteak and swallows it. Looking around the cafeteria I noticed that there's a group of people by the counter. I recognized their faces. Reiner, Bertolt, Ymir. I heard an argument. By studying their actions they were blaming someone. It was Armin. And he was scared.

I stand up but someone grabs my hand to stop me. " Eren no..." Mikasa said in a worrying voice "we're not starting a fight..."

" Are we just going to leave Armin like that?" I said immediately " He needs help—"

"Yes, I know that. Do you even have the windows of your soul?" Her eyes shifted from the group. " they're them. The highest castes" Her voice went down "we're the losers and we have to ignore them, remember?"

I don't feel right. This is all wrong.

Armin stood there. Locking his fingertips below the tray he was holding. He was shaking his head at every question he was asked to tell. Ymir slides the tray to the ground and pushes him as he stumbled backward. From the distance, I could hear that he was asking for forgiveness as they were not accepting it.

Queen Bee came holding a cup. She stares at him as she pours the juice above his head. She smirks as she laughs out loud following the others. That's it. This is making my system turn and my blood starts to boil.

I shove my arms away from Mikasa to free myself as I run towards Armin. Queen Bee aims to pour it again over him. But just in time, I shove it her wrist tightly to my hands. Gripping it so she'll not move. " Hey, what the fuck?!" She tries to get her hand away. Shaking her arms doesn't do anything. I heard gasps around the room.

"Let me go!!!" Queen Bee shouted.

" Why don't you stop doing that bullshit?"

Ymir stares at me. And starts walking towards me " hey hey young man.." She pulls Queen Bee away from me. " you better watch your mouth."

Queen Bee slowly looks at me. She stares at my eyes for seconds. Her eyes react as she recognized my face. "You..." she remembered me.

" for all that you did last night." I said, " I'll never forgive you."

"Fucking hell..." she swears under her breath.

Her words sting like a snake bite. Who knew Queen bee could be a snake while him a rat as her prey.

It is The Queen Bee and her prey.

To be continued...

Accomplished date:  
September 29, 2018  
4:07 pm


	2. Feelings

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Check out my twitter @Darkylanterhn  
> Instagram: @jopskayes

I'm inside of the school clinic. Where my body was giving up from beating Reiner and Ymir back in the cafeteria. Which was the wrong decision of mine.

Decisions were the hardest choices in life.

" Sit still" the school nurse just said while taping the cotton ball with rubbing alcohol against the scar above my check bone that made my body jolt from Its sting.

" is he going to be fine? He's not going to die is he?"

" Mikasa" I stared at her in a bold voice. " I'm fine..."

The nurse laughed as she put the cotton ball down to the med tray " he's fine" she gets the bandage and tears the tip of it to open it " it is just a small scar" she places it down against my skin " all done." She leans back to have an observation "Be careful next time, okay?" She pats my back

" mm. thanks," I said as I gently touch the bandage against my fingertips. I still feel the sting. Like a venom coming from the snake going through my bloodstream.

" you can go now" the nurse ordered.

"Thank you again" Mikasa bows showing her gratitude and great respect. That act of hers was coming from her mom. Mikasa is half Japanese and half German. Which their culture is still preserved inside of her.

" let's go?" She said looking at me.

I nod "mm.." I respond as I stood up from the seat and we walked towards the exit.

Our journey to our classroom went very silent. And only the footsteps were heard by our ears. I put my hands inside my pockets. Feeling so guilty of what I just did earlier.

" Thanks..." I said without looking at her. " for accompanying me." I kick the pebbles along the pathway as we pass them.

" No problem." She says. Looking towards the ground " at least those bastards didn't kill you" she looks at me. And in one second she gazed up to my scar. " does it still hurt?"

" A little bit." I said " I feel better than before. I'm fine really. " I pat her shoulder " you don't have to worry too much about me. It was my decision. And whatever happens, it's all up to me..."

She smiles with her arms on her back. As her eyes were staring at the ground " You're the only person who does that." She says " I was just standing there watching you beating up with Reiner and even Ymir." She pauses " and I thought. Wow. But..." she looks directly into my eye "why?"

" Armin needs help." I stopped "And I must help him because he's my friend. And friends must help each other. Am I right?"

Mikasa stands a few yards away. Looking back at me as the wind comes between us. The locks of her hair flow down with the wind. And the eyes of hers never let go of mine. She blinks and makes a beautiful smile. "You have a brave heart, Eren. I like that."

" I-i just..." I'm lost with my own words "I just don't want to see my friends get in trouble anymore..."

"Hmm..." she closes her eyes to feel the warm, sweet breeze. "I see..."

Later that day the class hours continues. The scar wasn't that bad. It's like a flash of light that marks on your skin. Everyone was staring at it. And they knew what just happened in the cafeteria. I knew everyone was watching. I knew everyone was talking about it. I heard so many rumors and make up stories about me. The majority of us praise the Queen Bee and no one is not allowed to disrespect her. And I broke that rule. And I know I'm in big trouble.

The classes are finally over. I immediately pack up my backpack and go home to prepare for my night shift.

But before I step outside of the classroom someone slammed the cup filled with juice to my white uniform. The cloth absorbs the juice and it made an orange smudge. " Oh. Sorry" he says while smiling "I didn't see you there." Then leaves off with a hysterical laugh.

"Bullshit" I cursed inside of my head. " It's time for me to try to survive in this hallway. " I thought

I went to my locker as I look for the keys inside of my pocket. My face banged against the metal of the locker. It hits my nose and forehead and the pain strikes towards my brain like thunder. My body falls to the ground. I almost passed out but then someone was kicking my back the whole time. I sat up very slowly, holding my back to avoid the pain. I looked up who it was. And it was Jean. The Bad Boy.

" oh look at you." Jean says smirking. " you poor little thing." He kicked me in the guts making me throw up my saliva. " Poor poor thing..." he clicks his tongue while shaking his head.

" Shut up..." I hissed

" I'm just here to remind you." He says simply moving his feet. " you're on duty today. Don't forget that." The last sentence hit me like a bullet.

Right. I'm on duty today. I've met the principal after I had fought with Reiner and Ymir inside of the cafeteria. I've explained everything that wasn't my fault. They started it and I came to help Armin. I watched them making fun of him that makes my body shiver in anger.

But the principal didn't listen.

" As a punishment, you need to clean the whole football field. That's all for now."

~~~~~

" What a loser! Look at him! Cleaning the whole field by himself!!" Group of people spitting words and shouting inappropriate words at me. Blaming me that I should not do what I just did in the cafeteria. After all, this was my punishment and I have to accept it. Because all I did was not listening. And I thought this was the right choice. But after all, my choice was the opposite.

" we're the losers and we have to ignore them." Mikasa's voice was recorded inside of my head. She's right. She was right. How stupid of me.

"Oi, Are you going to stand there and start blaming yourself?" A sharp deep voice coming from the distance. It was the Janitor.

" I'm sorry." I gripped the stem of the rack " S-sir."

This janitor was been here for a while. I've seen him along the hallways. Whenever there's a single spot that he was not satisfied with, he'll clean it immediately and trying to sweep it away as if it was the worst thing he had seen in his entire life. His eyes were the scariest part of him. He'll always glare if I didn't do it right. He's short, he's just on my shoulder. But, everybody will never know the background of his. Including me.

"Tch." He clicked his tongue " don't be so polite around me. I'm just a janitor."

I thought it'll be nicer to him. Since he acts more like a "sir" than a regular janitor around here.

"Continue working" he ordered " we have to clean this up before the sun sets"

I nod. " yes, sir."

I've been racking the dry leaves for almost an hour. My arms become so sloppy like they're ready to come off from my body. My sweat starts to water every time I move and my body and wanted to stop but there's a lot more to do. This field is so huge that the only thing I can manage was 1/4 of this field. Many more leaves are waiting for me to rack on them.

I gathered the leaves on the metal dustpan as I put it inside of the garbage bag. So I stopped for a while. Taking deep breaths and wiping off my sweat with my clean white towel and put it right back on my shoulder. I put my arm above the stem of the rack as I put my chin over it. I rested as I felt my heart beating slower and slower.

There's a lot of cheerleaders on the other side of the football field. I guess they were practicing by observing at them. I looked at them one by one as I immediately spotted her. And there she was. The Queen Bee.

She's focused. She doesn't look bored like the others would say. She's more like a leader, telling her groupmates what they should do. I could hear her voice that she may sound like a strict teacher or even a coach. And I immediately noticed her hair. It was tied up into a ponytail. And I thought that she looks very different... like a different person.

" checking on those girls? That's fucking great."

I jolt back as I straighten myself noticing that the janitor was just right behind me. " I-uh s-sir"

" who you checking at?" He walked beside me as he looked as well at the cheerleaders. " let me guess." He pauses "The Queen Bee" he looked back at me.

I swallowed air. I wasn't able to come up with what to say.

" guessed it" he turns around and continues to rack on the leaves.

"B-but sir I wasn't—"

" that girl was been here for a while. Since... I think when she was still in grade school. I still remember when the classes were over she would run to her big sister."

"how do you know that?" I asked

He stops " you want to know about her don't you?" I just noticed that he just ignored my question.

" I mean... everybody talks about her" I admitted it, avoiding eye contact. " and I found it very suspicious. Because everyone looks at her as a god or something "It's not like I have an interest in her like that. I was just..."

" you're starting to like her?" Levi immediately says that made my back sting.

" what no!" I almost shouted, " I almost lost my job because of her!"

" and you started hating her after that simple thing?" He asks

" of course I am," I said " if I lost my job there's nothing I can do... It's my only way of living and I can't simply lose that."

There's silence for a second. The janitor stood there, shocked by what I just said. After that, I could hear her voice from the distance so I gazed back at her. She was smiling, crossing her arms to her chest then she laughs like she's the happiest person around. Her bright smile and that little blush on her cheeks make me think that... she's... she's different. And it makes me feel different too.

" There are things that you can't simply be explained," He says as he steps beside me as he bends his arm and puts it above my shoulder " people do change." He smirks as he looks up at me " remember that..."

~~~~~

I finished doing my duty at 5:30 in the afternoon which means I have to go next at my night shift. Thankfully, Floch was there. So, I have no worries. He was a new employee and a new friend at least.

I put on my green apron and my cap as I heard a small buzz coming from my pocket. I saw a text message from my manager. Yep. I knew it. I'm in big trouble now. I opened the message.

I'll give you five days for you to solve your problem. You need to get the identification card from the customer who bought the liquor. You are against the law and I know you know that. If you didn't finish it right on time you'll be resigned.

Received 5:45 pm

"Fuck" I swore as I remained my eyes on my phone. Only five days? That'll be this weekend.

" what's wrong, man?" Floch just said right beside who is also a cashier boy. He leans closer to me as he tries to take a peek to my phone.

" the manager just texted me." I locked the phone as I put it back inside of my pocket. " that girl is ruining my life" I said with mixed of anger rushing down to my veins.

"Oh. Do you mean the girl who bought the liquor last night? Like you told me before?" He asked as he leans his back on the plain white wall as he crosses his arms.

I nod. I don't have to say it on my mouth. It feels more acidic through my tongue. And if it does, I'll hate it. " that bullshit" with that, I made myself sitting on the tiled floor. Hiding behind the cashier. " I swear to god. If she comes tonight, I'm going to fuck her in the face."

" oh yeah you will"

With disgust stung on my chest, I immediately looked to him and made a " what the fuck" face. I rolled my eyes " god, Floch..." that sounded like a groan.

" Who knows..." he raised her shoulders

" Shut the fuck up," I mumbled as I made myself standing up again and end this shift in no time. Hopefully...

~~~~~

It's nearly 3:07 in the morning. And I'm sitting on the stool with my back leaning against the wall with my both feet over the cashier. People may surprise that I still love reading newspapers. And I am doing it right now. With a pack of chips sitting beside me, I grab a couple of chips and shove it inside of my mouth.

Floch was sipping some orange soda as he leans over the cashier with his weight against his crossed arms. I can tell he was waiting for the costumers to come. The sipping sound becomes loud since it's the only sound I can only hear besides the soft background music played around the store.

" Only a few people will come at this time. It's very late, you know." I reminded him since it was his first three days at work.

He didn't respond. All I could hear was him humming to the song that was played on the speakers and also the stumping of his feet through the beat against the tiled floor.

The door rings as a sign that there was a customer. I heard Floch greeted " good evening, ma'am" as I immediately put down my feet to the ground and continued reading the article in the newspaper.

"Psst"

I keep my eyes on the paper as I ate more chips. Not even paying attention to him. " PSST!!" Floch kicks the stool that stumbles me over.

" DUDE!" He shouted but whispering at the same time.

"What the fuck do you want?" I said aggressively as I put down the newspaper.

I heard a small squeal coming to his closed mouth. And pointing his finger towards the aisle by his thumb as he bends his knees up and down and making a coca-cola shaped on the air by his both hands. All I did was pressing my eyebrows together and making a "what" face.

He annoyingly scratches his head " dude! That girl just came in. She got the most beautiful face in my entire life! God, her eyes shine like the clear blue sea when she looks at me."

I sighed as I rolled my eyes away from him " oh Floch. Come on..." I groaned

" dude! She got the coca-cola body man!"

" then what?" I just made the most boring voice in my entire life. " can we just continue our job and quit this chit chat?"

"Just look at her!" He immediately grabs both sides of my head as he moves it to the aisle.

I spotted the girl quickly. It's her again as expected. She's looking at the chips section. She's wearing a leather backpack with her hair tied up into a ponytail. Wearing a pale pink top, a denim skirt, and wearing plain white sneakers.

"See? I told you!" He whispers " she's looking like a goddess."

She grabbed a few packed chips to her arms. And when she's about to go to the cashier until she noticed me. Fuck fuck. I immediately hid at the bottom of the cashier as I sat on the floor.

Remembering what just happened in the cafeteria making me weak to confront her again. " How am I supposed to do..." I asked myself.

So I decided that I'll get some boxes that were laying on the ground and pretend that I'm going to put it in the staff room so that I'll get rid of myself from her. So I get the box as I stand up and looking straight and pretend that I didn't know her. I heard Floch asking me what I was doing but all I could do was to ignore and go to the right in the fucking staff room.

But when I was about to get to the staff room I saw her blocking me. My back stung just by looks at her. She stares at me for a while. She finches her eyes at my name tag " Eren..." she said and looks at me " so your name was Eren, huh?"

This was not the right idea. " what can I help you, ma'am?" I cringed calling her a "ma'am".

She smirks " so you're going to pretend that you didn't know me?"

I heard an arrow stung inside of Floch's heart. That must be painful. He must be shocked that this girl he'd admire knows me. Out of gaze, she suddenly sits on top of the cashier with her feet hanging off ground. " Oi!"

"Hmm? You hate me?" She leans back with her arm.

" was that even obvious?" I said immediately as I stump towards her as I grab her wrist " get off" I ordered " I said get off"

"Hey hey Eren.." her voice becomes soft as I noticed that my face was near to her that my nose was near to touch hers. " do you even know how low castes you are?" She says almost like a whisper " I'm the Queen Bee and your just an ordinary person. Am I right? You shall bow down before me." She makes a cheeky smile. " that's easy"

" I don't care which place I am. High or low that's just a rack." I said boldly " now get off before I ban you out."

She tilted her head to the side " hmm that's interesting" she said staring at my face " That's the first time I have interacted with a person like you."

" do you even understand what you have done last night?" I asked, " do you think I can simply forget that?"

She blinks for seconds as she tries to remember " oh yeah..." she says looking not so sure as she tilts her head, looking above the ceiling " what did I do exactly?" She asks gazing back at me

You empty-headed bastard. I thought. She doesn't even remember even a single thing like it wasn't a big deal for her. My eyebrows were pressed together as my head starts to ache from this anger. I clenched my hands as I said " you just violated a rule." I said boldly " I need your card to settle this"

She hopped down from the cashier as she puts out her wallet. Bringing out her bill to pay her selected chips. As I noticed Floch starts to patch it one by one " oi" I called her out

"I'm sorry" she gives the bill to him " keep the change" she whispers as she looks up right back at me " I don't enough time to talk this nonsense crap." She says as she gets her bag of chips as she grabs my hand and gives me a small piece of paper.

"Call me anytime," she says whispers. She smiled as she walks off the exit and winks at me before she left entirely.

The store went silent as I reminded standing. Looking at straight at the exit door as my hand stayed on its spot as I felt the small piece of paper on my palm. Shocked. She just touched my hand. My uncleaned hands.

I heard a long whistle coming from Floch. " damn Eren" he says " why you didn't tell me that you know her?" He says almost like a crying voice "she gave you her number. I'm jealous man..."

I blinked several times to come back from the thoughts that were coming from my mind. I immediately put the piece of paper inside of my pocket as I turned back to the cashier. " she's miserable" I mumbled.

"Well, you look flattered when she took your sweaty and wrinkled hands... yuck!" He made a gesture.

"Tch" I clicked my tongue " in your dreams..." I sat at my original spot as I put my legs above the cashier.

"Your dream girl Mm-mm-hm" he just sang the lyrics as he makes a small dance to his shoulders

"Shut up," I said annoyingly

~~~~~

Tuesday. Weekdays was always been the most stressful parts of my life. Attending classes in the morning to the afternoon was done. Since I didn't finish cleaning the football field as my punishment yesterday, I have to continue it today.

It feels like you're standing in the middle of the dessert. And there's no shade of the trees or even a cool wind. I stopped from racking the leaves as I felt myself panting and begging for more air. I wiped my sweat with my clean towel from my shoulder.

"Eren!" I recognized Mikasa's voice from afar. Armin was with her as well. He was following her behind.

"Ah, guys..."I feel relieved that they were here. I set aside the rack to the ground.

" will a short break will be granted by you?" She asked.

"Ah.." I nod " sure sure," I said

She grabs my hands as she pulls me towards the bleachers where Armin was already sitting and already waiting for us. We sat all together as I stretched my back, arms, and my legs. I felt a crack at the joints of my fingers also my back. " Finally," I said letting the tiring voice escape from my mouth. " I've been standing for almost an hour. Do you even know how tiring that was?"

"Luckily you didn't faint," Armin says " your body might dehydrate from this severe heat."

Mikasa pokes my shoulder as she offers me bottled water. " thanks" I immediately open the bottle as I drank it fast as I could that almost made me choke.

"You sure are thirsty," Mikasa says

Surprisingly, I emptied the bottle for five seconds. I've never been this thirsty before. I'm glad that Mikasa brought it for me or else I might suffer. "Thanks again" I wiped my mouth by my towel. Which is now moist because of my sweat.

" no problem," she says.

I looked at Armin as I noticed that Marco was absent again. I wonder why. " where's Marco?" I asked as Armin immediately looked at me as he heard his friend's name.

" he's been sick for days." He says neutrally " he got Pyrexia"

" Pyrexia?" I asked, wondering what it means.

Mikasa is starting to peel the apples by her small knife. Not paying attention to us. She sliced it and give it to each one of us. I mumbled her thanks as I chewed the sliced apple.

" Pyrexia," Armin says " from the Greek pyr meaning fire"

"Marco's temperature is getting higher. He got a fever" Mikasa says clearing things out.

I laughed " you should've said fever instead of something else" I admitted " you know I'm not that intelligent"

" I was trying to become an intellectual person," Armin says

"But you already are," I said

He smiles and looks at me for seconds as he separates our gaze by looking down to the ground. He lefts out a soft laugh " thanks by the way..." he says feeling doubtful " for helping me out yesterday. If you didn't come I think I'm going to be in big trouble by now. Thanks to you that that didn't happen."

Mikasa gives me more sliced apples as I took a bite. " hmm.... no problem." I said while making chewing sounds "I just don't want to see somebody getting hurt by other people." I swallowed " it makes me weak." I shivered.

"Bullying will never end if Queen Bee is still here," Mikasa says.

"She's right," Armin says in a low voice " I'll be honest here" he looks directly at me "she's the worst. It makes all things worst."

The words that I heard somehow make my chest stung. As if I were Queen Bee and they're saying things right in front of me. Whenever I look at her, there's always been a sign that she was soft. Sometimes, she's toxic.

Until I remembered yesterday. The time when I looked at her in this same spot where she was with her cheer mates. Her laugher makes me realize that this person can be different. Which is good nor bad... and complicated.

"Uhmm" Armin breaks the silence "Mikasa and I have been planning to go to Marco's place this weekend. wanna come?" He invites me.

"Uh sure," I said immediately " why not?" I chuckled.

The school bell suddenly tings the whole campus that the birds flew away from the branches. As a sign that everybody must go home.

I silently swore at myself the fact that I didn't finish cleaning the whole football field on time. This job is tiring.

"Well, I think it's time" Mikasa stands up as she fixes her skirt.

"We'll go now, Eren," Armin says, standing up and follows Mikasa " see you tomorrow"

"Hmm yeah," I look up to them " see ya..." I smiled.

~~~~~

It's 6:00 pm. There's no student to be seen at this time. I let out a sigh as I stretch my arms in the air as well as my back.

" Good work," The janitor said behind me. Staring at me with the same eyes as yesterday.

" Thanks, s-sir. Did I manage to finish it?" I said, feeling a bit awkward around him.

"You just did" he walks towards me and pats my shoulder several times with his hand covered with rubber gloves " you can go home now. I'll tell the principal about this"

My body beams up from happiness and relief " thank you so much!!"

After that, I immediately ran over back to the cleaning staff room to put the rack back in place. The hallways start to get dark since the sun is starting to set. When I was about to lock the cleaning staff room I heard murmurs around the corner.

I slowly pick up my bag to avoid making the tingling sounds coming from my guitar keychain hanging from my bag. I followed the sounds as I make my every step steady and quiet. When I reached the corner I half kneeled towards the floor as I took a small peek.

I was trying to understand every word the murmurs let out. But, it was like a whisper of the wind. Two people are standing by the hallway of lockers. By the tone of their voice, they were arguing something.

I stepped closer to have a better look. And until I realized that it was the Jock. Reiner and in front of him was Queen Bee.

What was she doing at this time? Why is she with him? What are they arguing about? The curiosity of mine starts to linger inside of my head. I knew Reiner was an acquaintance of her or even a best friend. I mean, they belong to the higher castes and they can get along unlike the lower castes like me.

There's suddenly a banging sound that almost made myself jump. I looked at them and I saw Queen Bee starting to shout at him and throwing the books to the floor where Reiner was holding. Queen Bee starts to push Reiner away from her but Reiner blocks and grabs Queen Bee by the wrist.

My body suddenly jolts seeing Reiner doing that to her. Luckily, Queen Bee shoves her hand away from him and starts to run away towards my direction. I suddenly make myself move but as soon as I stood up, she runs towards the corner and slams our shoulders together.

I hold myself up as I hold her shoulders to avoid falling. She suddenly looks to me and a surprised expression with tears falling coming from her eyes. Her faces were swelling red from crying a lot. She pushes me away and runs off to the main door of the building.

"Queen Bee!" I called her as I felt her tears from my white shirt. Somehow feeling down seeing her like that. Reiner must've done something that made her upset about it.

Without thinking, I decided to follow her behind.

~~~~~

The atmosphere is getting darker and darker. I ran through the dark path until I reached the main gate. I stopped as I bend over to catch up some air. I looked at the right and to the left, figuring which way she went.

The lamppost begins to shine through the dark road. And there's a bus stop on the right as I saw a small figure sitting on the bench. I ran towards the bus stop until it reveals Queen Bee. She's sitting down, looking towards the ground with her tensed grips on the edge of the bench.

I didn't what to approach her or disturb her. She feels upset and I don't want to get it worse. And until I remembered that she gave me her number from the convenience store. I put my hand in my pocket searching the small piece of paper as well as other pockets. Surprisingly, it was still there. I immediately put out my phone and starts to save her number.

I looked at her, thinking about what should I do. I open the messages and type "hi". Well, greeting someone is a starting point of a conversation, right?

A ringtone was suddenly heard from her phone. As she read the text. she immediately looks up as she noticed that I was standing beside her. " this was you?" She asked with a gurgling voice from crying.

I simply nod. " uhmm hey..." I said putting my arms behind my back. " I hope it's fine to stay with you."

"You can sit with me," she says as I slowly sat beside her " but not too close"

I immediately move inches away.

There's a silence after that. All I heard was sniffing sounds that made me look at her. She wipes her tears without her hands as she noticed her eyes were swollen red as well as her little nose. I put out my handkerchief as I offered it to her.

She looks at me for seconds and says " you're giving this to me?" Her voice seems surprised.

"Well, you do need one, right?"

She smiles as she gently accepted it and wipes it to her tears.

" I was wondering why you ran off like that." I admitted, " I just finished cleaning the foot field and I didn't expect that you'll show at this time." I said softly

" there's just a misunderstanding between Reiner and I," she says honestly, without looking at me. " which is... when I decided to broke up with him."

"W-wait you're dating him?" My voice raises from a sudden surprise.

" I was " she glared at me at the last word. " and now we're gone" her voice sounds like she's drowning " bullshit" she looks away from me " this is all bullshit." Her grip tenses up again " he cheated on me" her eyes start to tear up. " w-why would he do that..."

Her words feel heavy in my chest and telling myself to do something but all I could do is to look down and clasping my hands together. " I'm sorry about that," I said softly.

She lets out a chuckle " don't apologize to me. You did nothing wrong." She admitted and she looks at me for seconds " why are you looking at me like that? Seriously it's nothing..."

"Oh.." I straighten up my back. Looking like what? I thought. Her laugh makes me awkward around her. So, I move my eyes away from her. " I-ah-Uhm yeah..." I'm lost with my own words.

" you looked concerned about me. I appreciate that." She says that makes me look at her again with a surprising emotion on my chest. " breaking up with him was my decision. And I thought that... it's better this way you know..." she looked at the distance as the crickets start to sing. " Being free..."

I let out a sigh as I felt the cold breeze just passed by between us. As I remembered one thing. " My mom once told me," I said as she looks at me, wanting to know what it was. " Follow what your heart says."

She smiles " it's weird that you're acting like this. I thought you hate me so much."

I backed up " well, that's true." I said honestly " there's an attitude of mine where whoever looks in trouble, I'm going to help him or her whoever that person was" I scratched my head. Realizing that I was just like my mom.

"Oh.." she says " so that's why you try to fight me back in the cafeteria to save that brainy nerd." She says

I nod. " y-yeah..." I said softly, trying not to offend her. " I did that because I have to." I said, looking down at my feet. " hope you understand..."

The silence was the only thing I could hear. The cars rumbling along the road, the soft cold wind, and I could see the moon right above us. And I thought that this feels right. And I wished have done something to her. At least make her feel better.

" you're different..." she says softly without giving an eye at me. " you're a different type of loser."

I have to admit, I was a loser.

There's a black car slows down and stops right in front of us. Without realizing, she stands up and walks towards the car and opens its door.

She looks back at me and smiles " I have to go now."

I smiled as I raised my hand as a goodbye.

She gets in the car and offs down the road, following my eyes at them until it vanished through the distance.

I sighed through the cold breeze. My phone suddenly buzzed as I took it out. I opened as I read the text.

"Thanks... 😊 "

It was from Queen Bee that made me look at it for hours.

To be continued~

October 27, 2018, 12:05 pm


	3. Since that day happened

Inside of an isolated room. One door, one window, one cabinet, and one bed. The light rays from the moonshine through the window that makes a spotlight towards the floor.

My body felt sloppy, tired, and heavy from what just happened. My body suddenly moves that made me jump over the bed with a little bounce.

I was staring at the ceiling in my dark blackened bedroom. All my body parts feels like steel that made me too lazy to turn on the lights. I let out an exhausting sigh as I felt my eyes starting to feel heavy as well.

" you're different. You're a different type of loser."

I remembered how she said it. I don't know if it was a compliment or it wasn't. But that simple sentence of her makes me think that... something's different.

I mean... I don't know. I don't understand anything. I started to ask myself. Why do I not understand anything? Why do I keep thinking about that? Why am I like this? Was it her? Was she tricking me? Am I doing it wrong?

Arrrgghh...

I tiredly put my forearm over my eyes like lifting a sack of rice as I tried to keep calm and think that all I did was right.

There's nothing wrong around me but there's something wrong inside of me. I'm indeed a loser. The unexplainable loser.

My phone vibrates inside of my pocket that I found it a little bit creepy in this very dark room. "Hello?" I let out the most tiring tone in my whole life and not even knowing who it was.

" Eren it's me, Mikasa"

"Ah, Mikasa.." I rub my eyes as I let out a yawn in the middle of the upcoming sentence " why are you calling me?"

" I was just going to tell you something about school tomorrow since you were excused to clean the field earlier."

"Ahh I see..." after that, I couldn't remember what she said. The sound went softer and softer like an echo through a whisper. After that, my eyes slowly fall to sleep. The phone stays on my ear as I felt my arm starting to fall to the mattress.

" and about Queen Bee—"

That name made me wide awake. I suddenly sat up in seconds that my phone almost drops on the floor. Luckily, I caught it on time. " did you just say, Queen Bee?" I asked immediately.

" uh yeah," I felt her confusion throughout her voice " didn't you hear? She tweeted that some guy helped her out earlier. And It's strange that... Queen Bee never asks for help from anybody. Especially to the lower castes. To us."

A jolt of surprise was felt. Thinking that... what was Queen Bee referring to? To a person who belongs to a lower caste? Why would a higher castes let the lower castes help her? It was me, wasn't it? I'm the only one who got a conversation with a higher caste. Why am I hoping that it was me? It could be somebody else, right?

" ah... I see. T-that's strange" I mumbled. That thought made me somehow fall into pieces.

" Eren, what did you say?"

" it's nothing. And thanks for that uhm... info."

"Mm... you're always welcome."

~~~~~

Since that day happened, I couldn't understand why I am always thinking about her. Her smile, her eyes, her face, and her voice. Whenever I'm alone I'm always daydreaming about what happened at the bus stop.

That was the first time that I have a normal conversation with her. It feels like, that wasn't my true self when I talked to her. It feels like somebody is playing the role to talk in front of the person who you truly dislike.

But since that happened, she made me feel different. I still don't know what it really means.

School normally started. Armin was the only one who noticed that I was the "different Eren" than before. Even I was confused when he first said it. He said that I mostly smiling at myself the whole time. He said I would look at my phone every second as the time passes by. He never normally sees me like this. Even I, never see it myself too.

But when the time goes on, I realize that there's finally a purpose. A reason.

It was Queen Bee herself. She's the one who made the " different Eren". I am the only one who knew that answer. I was afraid to tell it to everybody. She belongs to the higher castes and I belong to the lower ones.

Was I, not allowed to be with her?

Since that day happened, it all went strange. Everybody was talking about what Queen Bee just tweeted on Twitter means. Everybody was curious about who the "guy" was. Everybody was expecting that it was her "new" boyfriend. Who knows. Even my friends didn't know yet.

And I have a feeling that the "guy" Queen Bee was referring to was me.

Since that day happened, she's been absent for days as well as Reiner. The University went silent at peace. Some of them were rejoicing that Queen wasn't around. Some of them were weeping because " The jock" Reiner wasn't around. The higher castes went dead. As in, like the war between higher castes and lower castes has been ended.

Mikasa and Armin were rejoicing as well. And I have been pretending that I was on their side. But for me, since that day happened...

I felt empty without her.

~~~~~

Weekend. The most relaxing two days a week. Mikasa and Armin invited me to go to Marco's residence since he's been sick for a whole week. And I understand because they were friends. And friends were always helping each other.

Well, I can't deny that am I?

" I am appreciated that you guys come here. I'm so grateful." Marco says whose body was wrapped with his warm blanket.

I felt like a missing piece of the puzzle. Sitting in a slouch position with my legs crossed on the floor. Sipping some dutch mill looking at them talking at each other. To be honest, I felt like I don't know what I want to talk about with them.

" I'm really glad you got a little bit better." Armin says " do you think you'll come to school on Monday?" He asks

Marco nods as he takes a tissue and wipes it under his nose. " yeah, I think I will. It feels like ages since I've been in school."

I chuckled at myself. I don't even care about school. Surprisingly, he's like a kid who is always excited to go to school on the first day.

Mikasa just came in from the kitchen, holding my phone on her hand. She spotted me on the floor and says. " I think someone's calling you"

Someone's calling me?

She gives the phone to me. I noticed that it was just a mobile number calling me. It might be just a stranger. I answered it anyway. "Hello..?"

There's a chappy sounds at first that made me think that somebody's calling me for a prank. "Hello?" I said, standing up to find a better signal as I walked towards the balcony.

" Hey hey hey.." a female voice yet in an energetic tone " It's me Eren!!" It almost breaks the speakers from this squeal. I put away the phone immediately ad I felt my ears itching. I rubbed it with my finger as I eagerly put the phone on the other side.

" what the fuck? Can you at least lower your voice down? who is this? and why are you calling me?" I sound like an angry old man alone on the street. " you called the wrong number. I'm sorry."

"W-wait wait!!" She said immediately " I know you who are and you know who I am.." she says carefully like only the two of us can only hear. " are you seriously don't recognize my voice yet? Come on... We even have a chit chat on the bus stop, remember?"

Oh... Fuck. I remember that.

" Q-queen B-bee?" I said very carefully, readjusting my position by leaning back to the balcony. And I can see Mikasa and the others inside. It looks like they don't have attention to me. Including the phone call. "W-why are you calling me? It's in the middle of a damn day. That's so random. Especially you."

"I'm so sorry for bothering you." She said, "I was just thinking about what I did back then." Her voice becomes soft. It somehow makes it feel more different than usual. " you know... when I illegally got the liquor in the convenience store without my card. I just want to apologize to you."

" wow. Q-queen Bee—" what's this? It's so sudden.

" I know it may sound weird that I, the higher castes apologizing to a lower caste. I don't why I want to apologize to you. I just feel like that I have to do it."

Mikasa gets a gaze from me. She's smiling telling me to come inside and eat tuna sandwiches that she made earlier. I smiled and nod back as I responded that I'll take it later.

" hey Eren. About the day when you told me that I have to give it to you my card. I'll finally decide that I'll give it to you."

"What?!?" I almost shouted, " for real?!?" I turn around and grips the barriers on the balcony and my feet almost jump into happiness " finally thank you so much! I'll never get fired again HA!"

I heard her chuckle. " go to Nikolo's Bakery cafè. I'll wait for you."

" w-wait right now?"

"Yes."

" Alright," I sniffed " I'll be right they right away."

I almost tripped off the ground as I open the sliding door. I immediately grab my backpack sitting from the sofa and tying my shoes through the laces. " Eren? What's the commotion?" Mikasa wonders and she stands right behind me.

"Mikasa. I just—" I stand up turning towards her. Surprisingly, I was a few feet taller than her. " there's just an emergency meeting from the—uh— the manager." I lied. And I have to. " I have to hurry."

"Oh." That's what all Mikasa said. Still wasn't sure why am I leaving.

" well, good luck then, Eren." Armin greeted " I hope it's good news, not the bad one"

"Of course. See you all later!" My voice became higher from its happiness. And I don't know where it came from. I turned the doorknob and open the door. I stepped on my feet and dash over the corridor.

" Eren!"

I suddenly stopped when I heard Mikasa's voice, letting out for me. I turned around as our eyes met. She smiled, putting her clasps hands to her chest. She smiles so sweet and loving like a lost angel in the heavens. " Be careful." She says

"Yeah!" I shouted back " I will Mikasa!" After that, I ran off over the corridor and down the stairs. I still felt her eyes when she met mine. Her eyes were full of hope. I smiled at myself. I never would think that I goth would act like that to a regular student like me.

~~~~

The smell of strong coffee beans. The smell of sweet butter and soft olive oil. The walls were colored with dark chocolate wood. The floor was soft caramel. Everyone was quiet. Drinking their tea or coffee on each small round coffee table. Some were reading books and newspapers. With these simple silence. It makes my skin shiver.

"Nee, Eren..." A whisper suddenly heard on my left ear. I stepped on the side and turned around.

Wow...

She was wearing a white spaghetti top with a floral skirt down to her ankles. And jewelry on her ear and a small gold rose pendant on her necklace. Her hair was gone short, just above her shoulders. And her bangs were clipped behind her ears.

I feel astonished.

" let's save the talk." She says. It feels weird to hear her voice again. " follow me" she takes the lead. Hearing her footsteps towards the wooden floor.

We sat on our coffee table just beside the glass window. We can saw the busy streets outside, the people walking around the sidewalk like regular days in a cozy warm café. The waitress came at us and asks for an order. Queen takes the lead as she softly says "just two cups of dark coffee please" and the waitress left and went to her place. Queen Bee finally looks at me. Her eyes were soft blue like the sky above. She puts a strand of her hair behind her ear.

"I—uh—uhm."

She chuckles, hearing my embarrassing sound on my mouth. Oh dear god, what should I do?

"You don't need to be so formal," she says " it's been one week since we last met, huh?"

"Y-your h-hair.." The first thing I noticed when she came. Her face makes my heart running its speed.

"Yeah..." she lowered her eyes. " since when I broke up with Reiner, I decided to change" she gazed up to me " I just wanted to move on"

" I think it looks g-good" I just complimented. Wait for what? Did I just compliment to a person whom I hate the most?

"You think so?" She laughs " I didn't expect you'll say that to me."

I scratched my head as I looked around the room, avoiding her eye contact with me " neither do I" I finally said.

Fuck. I'm so awkward.

The waitress offers us two cups of coffee. Queen Bee took a sip with her eyes closed through the hot steam. I noticed her long eyelashes and her soft expression towards me. And I thought that... this is different. This is different from before.

" Tell me, Eren." She says after drinking her coffee. " how was the school without me?"

I swallowed. Since that day happened, she's gone absent for almost a week. Since that day happened, everyone was happy that Queen Bee wasn't around. Everyone looked fine. Everyone looked like it's just an ordinary day without the bullies including Reiner. Since that day happened, it looked normal. But for me, it's not right without Queen Bee or the ultimate bully. It doesn't seem right.

If I told her the truth. Will she be okay?

" I felt like... something's different without you," I admitted. " I mean... it's not normal."

"Huh?"

Her expression through her voice surprises me. Did I do something wrong? I bit my lower lip as I avoided her eyes towards me by looking down at the coffee table. " it's not normal without me you say?" She said, questioning me.

" Is there something wrong?" I said carefully, looking at the wall behind her. Pretending that I made eye contact.

"Yes.." she says under her breath. " a lower caste saying that to a higher caste is not normal." She rubs the surface of the coffee cup as she looks down at the table. " I thought lower castes were supposed to be weak. Supposed to be happy when higher castes were gone for a while." She looked up " y-you." Her eyes stab my chest " why?" She asks " You're different than others..."

"W-what do you mean?" That's the only question that I was able to ask.

" You're not..." she pauses and looks at me for a second. Looking deeply into my eyes, trying to find something with it. She left a soft chuckle as her eyes gazed down to the coffee table, shaking her head. " you're very different." She softly says " It's like you breaking a rule even though it doesn't even exist."

" You're different... you're a different type of loser..."

I understand now.

Was it wrong to be different? I belong to the lower castes and I am the ones who were weak. The one who's given up. The one who is broken. The one who hurts all the time by other people. And I belong to them.

Am I weak? Am I the ones who've given up immediately? I've been thinking that all the time. And I keep saying to myself. I'm not weak. I'm not afraid of anything. I don't give up. I never will. I fought in the cafeteria. Swears and complains to all the higher castes. I'm the person who always fought for what is right.

And I belong to the lower castes.

Am I not playing my right role?

I'm just a regular person who has no ambitions or dreams in life. Am I not playing my right role?

We both went silent. Clasping my hands together under the table. My shoulder was stiff and wasn't relaxed at my current position. This silence answers my question.

I didn't play my right role.

Queen rustles something from her bag. Pulling out her wallet as she slides it over the table her identification card to me.

Her name was there. Historia Reiss.

" I'm sorry for my mistakes, Eren. Back at the convenience store. I'll never repeat it..." she whispers at the last sentence. " Hey, um... Eren.."

He gazed up at her as she called my name.

"After this..." she says " can we not talk to each other anymore?"

~~~~~

I-I c-can't..—

" hey dude, ya alright? You've been staring at nowhere for like... two minutes."

I blinked several times as I wiped my face with my bare palms. Rubbings my eyes with my fingertips. I let out an exhaustive groan as I scratched my head and puts it over the counter. " bullshit. Mother god. Fuc—"

"Oi oi oi. Language, Mister." Floch just said beside me. " seriously though, if you're going to do that all night, just go home. You'll affect the service here" he starts to wipe with a slightly wet table cloth to the dusty areas in the alleyway.

Queen Bee doesn't want to see me or talk to me anymore. It's wasn't like she doesn't want anything about me but because she feels wrong to be an acquaintance with me. Because we have barriers. Limitations.

The light on the back turned off as I noticed that Floch was the one who switched it. I looked at the time. It was 3:00 in the morning. " we sleep early tonight." Floch just said, starting to close the other lights. " god, I miss my bed" he mumbled.

" oh yeah before I forgot." He said turning around towards me and brings up two boxes of cocktail brands. " we deliver these bad boys to the bar" he taps the cover " and you come with me, ya?" He tries to make an expression and it wasn't effective on me.

" let's go." I immediately pick up the box and went straight to the exit.

" Hey hey hey!" He called " wait up, you bastard!"

It takes 15 minutes to get to the bar that Floch was talking about. It was a very cold night. Every time I inhale, there's always a fog that will escape from my mouth. Standing from outside of the bar named " Jon Taffer." I can even hear the loud beating music from the inside.

Floch steps inside. And I followed behind. There are a lot of flashing lights. I can't hear my voice in this very loud music. I can even feel the vibration of the beat through my shoes. There's a lot of people dancing around the dance floor. The scent of vape and cigarettes was flowing in thin air. And that made me a little dizzy.

Floch went to the bartender. Who is standing by the cocktail area? I tiredly put the box over the marbled glass table as I fixed my seven-eleven cap on my head.

I haven't been to a bar like this before. By looking at the displayed bottles of champagne and other types of drinks, it looks so... expensive.

I looked at the side where there's a girl who looks depressed. Her hands were locked together with her elbows standing on the table. She leans her forehead to her clasped hands as she looks down to the ground. Her eyes were sparkling by the tears slowly swelling down to her skin.

" Hey, Eren let's go!" Floch shouted through the music as he puts his hand on my shoulders " hey Eren—"

I didn't think at first. My feet start to step on its own as I slowly walked towards the girl. She got a small petite body as her head still looks down to her lap. And her tears shine from the light that makes little droplets of rain.

" e-excuse me.." I said as I carefully pat her shoulder.

She jumps in surprise as she looks up to me.

Huh?

" Q-Queen Bee?!" My voice rises " w-what are you doing here?" From this point, I've thought of why she was here, why is she upset? Why is she alone? Why is she crying? What happened? What happened to her? I want to ask all of that but my mouth was shut.

She forcefully smiles I can tell. " Eren~"

She's not fine. She's not fine. I looked over to her side as I saw several shot glasses. I think that's more than ten. She's been drinking all this time?!?

" hey you" The bartender called me " are you an acquaintance of her?" he asks and I agreed " you should take her home. She's been drinking vodka for like hours and hours. She's totally drunk man. Bring her home."

" Oi!" Queen shouted all of a sudden as she points her index finger like a gun " How many times did I tell you that I am not drunk, alright? You're getting so annoying!!"

" I'll take care of this," I said as I move Queens Bee's arm away from him.

" c'mon Eren... let's just stay here for a while yeah..?" She tugs my shirt " c'mon join with me..."

" Queen Bee please." I put her arm over my neck as I grab her waist " let's go."

Floch just came it and was surprised that 3:00 am girl, yep that's what he named her, was here in this crowded area. Floch helped me out behind as he puts her arm over his shoulders as well.

We moved along the midway to the exit but Queen Bee's legs stopped moving as if it was hanging off the ground. " c'mon walk" Floch eagerly says but it doesn't work. And it ended up giving her a piggyback ride.

Her breath tickles against my neck. With her breathing in a slow rhythm. And her arm embraced with my neck as I hold her thighs to avoid falling to the ground. She's heavy. But it's fine. " I'll take her home," I said.

" what? Ya sure, buddy? I mean we could call her parents or something else—"

" it's fine," I said boldly " I'll take care of her."

I know she'll surely be upset is she finds out about this. She's drunk. And depressed. How could this girl feel this way?

" R-Reiner..." She whispers to my ear and somehow felt sadness through her voice. Her grip tightens against the hem of my shirt. " I s-still... love you... Reiner..." her voice shakes and starts to weep on my shoulder.

Since that day happened, I felt empty without her. That's what all I thought

And now that she's here since that day happened, I felt like a nobody.

She still loves him... who hurts her in pieces...

To be continued...

November 29, 2018


	4. Bacon Noodles

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Warning: NSfW

The bacon was sizzling against the hot boiling oil on the pan. I switched it over by the spatula as I felt my head slowly moving down that my eyes were starting to shut down. I immediately put it back in place. I blinked several times, probably more, to wake myself up.

Dammit, Eren. Put yourself together.

Well, I didn't sleep. I stayed all night on the sofa. I keep trying to close my eyes to sleep but this time, I think I'm having insomnia. Last night, all I did was watching TV at a very low volume. All the lights were turned off and the only source of light that can be found was on the television.

I have to secure her. Well, this time only. To keep on eye on her. She's currently inside my bedroom. Having a great bedtime sleep. She cried a lot and I felt her pain by looking at her face and tears. That makes me think that this girl has suffered more than I think.

Leaving your loved one must be tough, huh. Typical girls. They always cry after break up. Come on, there are literally more guys out there. Tears are such a waste. She must be grateful that she met him. Because without him, I don't think she'll not become what she was right now.

Give thanks, and move to another. It's like Ariana Grande's new song. "Thank you, next." But trust me, I never knew that song until I saw it on Twitter.

The bacon is cooked. I put it on the plate with beans and cooked rice that I bought last night. Last night was a journey. I freaking saw Queen Bee in the bar, putting her inside of my apartment, bought some groceries for her today and freaking didn't sleep to keep on guard on her. How great for being a low caste, am I?

Sometimes I'm blaming myself. Why did I want to help her? She's a nobody to me. She's just some mean girl in school. But it feels like I am the only low caste that has a lot of interactions with a high caste, specifically Queen Bee. Did I just break the history?

I went to my bedroom as I knocked on the door three times but has no response. I knocked again but this time, I called her. " Queen Bee, it's time for breakfast. Wake up" No response indeed. I turned the doorknob " Queen Be—"

An object just hit my nose that makes me stumble backward. The pain stings up to my skull that I can feel the heartbeat to the affected area on my nose. I looked at the objective realizing it was my deodorant. " Argh fucking hell" I swear

" You?!" She shouted almost sounded like a squeal. " how fucking dare you!" She starts to throw all of my stuff from my side table. This time, I have time to defend myself by giving a shield move by my arms. And dodging every object that'll come to hit me.

" Stop!" I shouted and my coin purse just literally hit my head. " Argh!" I stepped backward as I protect my head by covering my hands. "If you're going to throw all stuff at me, it's not helping!"

" Where the hell, am I?" She asked immediately " what is this place? Why am I here? And you. Why are you—"

" OK OK" I mid crouch down and letting my arm in front of me. Maybe she'll hit me again. I don't trust this woman. "but first things first" I cleared my throat but before I open my mouth, she throws my dragon ball figure and fucking hit my eye. " ARGH Stop—"

" Answer my fucking question before I fucking kick you in the balls. Got it?" Now she's holding my pillow. " First, I'm in some else's house, and second you" she glares at the last word " you fucking here in fucking front of me. Again."

I rolled my eyes " you clearly don't remember?" I point at her " you were so drunk last night. Yeah? Remember that? That I have to bring you home to my apartment" I can clearly tell that she's irritated about my annoying voice " sounds good right? Thank me that nothing negative happened to you"

" nothing happened?" She softly asked

I was analyzing what she just said " what do you mean?"

"Argh," she groans as she fixes bet hair and crosses her arms eagerly " you know, sex?" She says, with an eye roll.

I felt a jump on my chest after what she said.

My face starts to heat up then felt my goosebumps along to my arms and legs. I mouthed remained open that my eyes keep switching places, not focusing on her face. Which is very closely across mine. My mind went blank like an empty space. I really don't know what to say next. And there, I felt my sweat slowly sliding down on the sides of my forehead. " W-what??" That is what I think that my voice went shattered.

How can this girl say that so confidently?

She smiles smugly. " as expected of low castes like you," she says and starts to walk near to me.

I slowly stepped backward that my eyes were steady on her. She puts her arms on my shoulder as she tiptoed on me. My heartbeat is beating faster that I could hear it inside of my eardrum. I pressed my lips together keeping them shut as possible. Her face gets nearer and nearer to my face that made me close my eyes to all this nervousness.

What is she doing? What is she doing to me? Just let me go. I don't like this. This makes me uncomfortable. I felt her nose brushing lightly to my cheek that I could taste her breath. My legs start to tremble that I might fall to the ground.

" you're a virgin, aren't you?" She whispered

"Eh?" I snapped. She's still staring me as I felt her hands were wrapped around my back of my neck.

" do you expect something from me?" She traces my neck by her index finger. Tracing down and down at a slow pace and it stopped right on my chest. " say it." She says " I know you want me to."

" what are you? still drunk?" I hissed in a snap.

I shove her hands away from my neck. As I stepped back to the doorframe. " Are you saying if someone is drunk, I'll fuck you up right away like in romance fairy tale stories? Disgusting." I hold the doorknob

I didn't realize that my body reacts to my mind can think about it first. It's like sudden electricity that strikes your chest. "As expected like a girl like you."

I paused as I opened the door and stepped backward. My voice went bold and serious. "I'll meet you at the dining table."

" I was just testing you." She said pitifully, probably making fun of me. " and I'm glad of the results. You have self-defense. I like that." She smiled. A different kind of smile.

" who cares about that?" I rolled my eyes away, closed the door, and walked down to the hallway.

~~~~~~

I could feel the heat fog from what I just prepared for myself. I hold the cup both sides by my palms and the heat, more like a warmth, travel to my nerves up to my brain. It's good. This is what I must feel during the mornings. The cold night as ice will slowly melt it away.

So I took my spoonful of the soup. Blows it and slowly took a sip. The taste of beef and carrots and vegetables down to my stomach makes me, even more, wake up. Thank god, I feel more alive than before.

" you literally consume instant noodles for breakfast?" Queen Bee says right across the table. " you know that is unhealthy, right?"

I dip the fork and twirl it to make the noodles " this is like my food for my entire life." And rise it up as it releases more steam " and you should not tell me what I should do next. That's never going to happen." And slowly shoves it inside my mouth. " oh god. It's so good" I said, with noodles.

" oh, your poor kidneys." She says leaning her chin over her palm. " it must be destroyed for eating noodles for your entire life you say. Or even start to form kidney stones." She sits up straight " and trust me. It's not good to have those." She eagerly smiles " probably that's the reason why you're so thin and lightheaded the whole time."

I chuckled " I have already heard that from many people" I stir the soup by the spoon as it releases more fog, spreading upwards " oh wow you better stop that coz ya might die whatever that shit" I mocked

"Hmm okay." She says softly " if that's what you want, then fine." She leans back and crosses her arms "Because I don't give a damn about you." She giggles " oh besides, you're lower than mine."

"Before you talk something else." I said as my voices stood up " you better thank me that I cooked that bacon for you" I pointed at it " You know what that costs? 150. Damn. It feels like my pockets are empty now."

" Why thank you, young man." She copies the gesture of a princess " a servant who offers his money to her queen. I like that." She smirks. She starts to poke the bacon by the fork. And takes it and shoves it to her mouth. " that's pretty good, actually" She said covering her mouth.

"T-thanks?" I questioned her.

And she gives me a questionable facial gesture " You know." She sighs and starts to change the topic " You're kinda not bad after all." She stands up from her seat and walks towards me.

" what are doing?" My eyes were so steady looking at her.

She moves the chair, where I am sitting, away from the table, and starts to sit on my lap, facing on me. " Q-queen Bee..?"

" Why are you so like this?" She whispers with our foreheads touches together. " I never met a low castes person like this before." She puts her arm, straightening it over my shoulder as our noses touched. " and I know everyone wants a reward after that hard work."

" do you think this is legal?" I whispered

I saw her making a small smile as she slowly gazed up to me. " I don't think so."

Our lips touched. My heart suddenly hitched and felt my goosebumps to my tiny hairs along my arms. Her hand starts to move and starts massaging my hair. My hand moves to her back, holding her very tightly.

She leans back and looks at me for a second "open your mouth" she ordered.

"Wha—"

She leans in with her tongue inside. Her body moves in a rhythm. I hold her slender waist as I move them closer to my torso. I hear my heart racing as I heard her heart beating when she leans closer until it meets my chest.

I could taste her saliva. Sweet and bitter. But the longer it gets, the more it gets sweeter. She switched her head on the other side to get a comfortable position. She holds my chin as she slowly traces it with her fingertips.

I lost my breath so I lean back, breaking the kiss. As I panted, giving more air to my lungs. And I realized that my mouth went slimy.

" your first kiss?" She says softly.

I swallowed. " yes." I said breathlessly as I hold her waist leaning forward to her to give one more. " I've never done this before." My body went so light. I don't even know why.

" You better not turn on to me," She says looking closely to my eyes. And leans closer until I smell her breath.

" I think I am now," I said in a whisper.

My hands keep roaming around her body. Her soft, firm thighs. I slip my hand under her shirt and I touched her small belly with both hands. This pace was faster than before. She grasps my neck. Our tongues twisted inside. Her other hand tightly grips my hair and moves harshly to the side.

I've never felt this good before. What. What is this feeling? It's so strange to me.

I slowly undo her shirt. Moving my hands up to her breasts. As I slowly massaging them. Soft and firm like the thighs. She moans through the kiss. Suddenly leans back and bit my lower lip. Looking at me fearlessly. I softly chuckled and suddenly bit my lip harder " Argh—"

I heard her soft giggle as she leans in, goes for another hungry kiss. She moves her hips closer to my crotch area. And begins with a swaying movement on it. Without any hesitation, I started to move upward as my body moves on its own. "Aahh" her voice shivers " hah...."

~~~~~

" I thought you still love him," I said looking at her across the table.

It's in the afternoon. The sun is now about to set. Orange to reddish rays glazing across the floor from the window on the kitchen area. The curtains dances with a small blow from the wind outside. The room was quiet. The two us were awkwardly sitting across the table. Clasping my hands together, waiting for her response. But it seems she went quiet for a while.

Queen Bee is currently wearing my white t-shirt that was too oversized for her. She sits with her knees, sipping some coffee I just made for her. " I don't understand." She says, without looking at me "what do you mean 'him'?"

I scratched my belly. My body shivered from the chilling wild from my electric fan. Since I wasn't wearing any top at all. I placed my both arms over the table and said. " do you even remember what happened last night? Even the slightest bit?" I made a hand gesture by closing my thumb and index finger a little bit.

She went silent. She blinks several times and she looks down at the table. " all I could remember was." Her voice went croaky. " I went to a bar late at night. And I cried. Well before that..." she puts down her coffee cup. " I saw Reiner... when I was on my way home." She takes a heavy sigh " and he's with someone. A girl. A beautiful girl. Beautiful than me. And I don't understand what it feels like when I saw them" she hugged her knees even tighter by looking as her tight grips. " I don't know if I'm upset, sad, happy, depressed. But it hurts." She looked at me " it hurts inside." She puts her hand on her chest, slowly closing forming a fist.

People have so many perspectives with different types of situations. A broken-hearted person, leaving a mark as a memory that they made. Sometimes, experiences can change you for the better. It happened because it has a purpose in you. And you'll never know it until you realize it in the future.

" I'll be honest here," I said gently which makes her look more interested at me. " I pitied you last night." I continued " When I saw you. I just can't help it but help you. You know that, right? You know the—"

" The attitude of yours that if you saw someone needs help, you help them." She finished.

" exactly" my voice beams up. " and that night. You keep on calling him. That you still..." I sighed, realizing how frustrating this is to say " love him."

Her expression was mixed with shock and sadness. But there is still more emotion hidden from her clear blue eyes. There were so many untold stories. She pressed her eyebrows together, trying not to cry right in front of me. She puts her head over the table and covers it with her arms. Hiding her emotions from me. " Idiot" that's all she could say. " I'm such an idiot."

" You still love him, do you?" I asked softer this time to prevent offending her.

" No!" She almost shouted " I hate him. I hate him so much." Every word gets softer and softer and breaks it with a soft cry in the end.

Love stories can be complicated. It could be worst than your everyday life. Love has experiences and memories. Everyone has our own love story. It could be sweet as honey or bittersweet with a mix of saltiness. I always thought that the more you hate the person the more you love the person. Does it happen that way until now?

" How ironic," she says breaking the silence. She slowly raises her head and looks straight at me. " Yesterday I told you that I don't want to talk with you anymore. But what did I got?" Her voice went serious " you're here. Listening to my mourns. Kinda annoying, yeah?"

" That's how life works." I raised my shoulders " sorry..?" I think that's not the right answer but I said it anyway.

There's a sudden knock on the door. I felt a sudden jolt on my nerves realizing that Queen Bee was here inside. Mikasa? Could it be Mikasa? I suddenly looked at her and whispered " go to the kitchen" she doesn't enough time to resist and she did what she was told.

I walked straight to the door and I opened it. Just a little bit. But then there's a sudden push that spreads the door open. " Eren!!"

I stepped backward avoiding hitting the opening door to my face. " Floch?" I blinked " what are you doing here?"

Floch. A typical kind of guy who would suddenly appear in front of you out of nowhere. Since when I first met him, I could already tell that he's going to make my daily life tough as a rock. Although, he helped me with Queen Bee last night which is hard to accept that he encouraged me to help this girl out. I don't have many options left. And all equal to this.

"you see, since what just happened yesterday I just wanted to take a vis— Woah Woah Woah wait a minute" He takes a glance on me. Starting from the bottom to top. I see the confusion on his face. " you're half-naked" he says slowly with a different meaning " you're fucking half-naked."

"It's not what you're thinking!" I shouted " Jesus Christ." I pinched the bridge of my nose "Just what do you want? If all you want is to go outside with me, then I'll refuse. I don't have time. I have so much stuff to do for tomorrow, alright?" I noticed his eyes that were not looking at me. His eyes were gazing somewhere else behind me. And that gives me a nerve. Don't tell me he saw—

"Uhm. Hey..?" I heard Queen Bee from behind.

Fuck.

Without thinking, I pulled him inside and lock the door immediately. Queen Bee just stood there. Switching her eyes to the left and right, probably waiting for something. She just stood there and makes a little wave and smiled towards Floch.

Floch slowly turns back at me and asks " What the hell just happened?" He holds my shoulders and shook them slightly " I need answers. Now."

I was stuttered. I don't even know what to say next. What does he prefer? What answer does he want? " as you can see.." I said looking back to Queen Bee who has stood by the kitchen table " she has no single scratches on any parts of her body." I shove his hand away from my shoulders " She's fine and everything is fine."

There's no need to be worried about, isn't it?

" uhh," I scratched the back of my neck " this is uhm Floch." I said, introducing him to her. " my workmate."

She bows down and smiles " nice to meet you." She says " call me Queen Bee."

"Queen Bee?" Floch chuckled " Who would name that to a person? Queen Bee? As in... motherfucking queen bee at the bee farm?"

" that's what most of the people call me." She sits on top of the table. " is there any problem with that? The royalty was only me. I am one of the most top castes at school. In short, I'm the queen." She smirks " they all honor me and I hope you do the same."

Back at the cafe. She brings up her ID and saw her real name. " Historia." Her real name was "Historia Reiss." This feeling that I have felt when I saw her name keep telling me to keep it a secret. The way she introduces to other people, it's like she doesn't want anyone to know her real name. There must be a history behind it. I'm sure. And I don't know why I am willing to know more about it.

" Floch. Floch Forster." He suddenly puts his arm on my shoulders " you see this guy?" He points at me. " I know everything about him."

" We just met three weeks ago—"

He puts his hand beside his mouth and whispered " He's a fuckboy."

" I fucking heard that" I glared that him " and that's obviously not true at all."

"Oh? He was?" She fake questioned and completely ignored what I just said. I don't know if she's being sarcastic or not. " that doesn't show to his face." She looks at me and smirks " or even his body type. He's completely a virgin. I can tell." She crosses her arms. Showing her pride at me. " anything you want to say, hm?"

" hey hey hold up miss." Floch cut us off, pushing me away from Queen Bee. He steps forward and says. " if you going to date him, it's too late now, miss 3 am girl. He's with Mikasa. And you can't do anything about it."

I rolled my eyes " Floch—"

" oh, you mean the goth loser girl?" She raised her eyebrows " how surprising." She says in a monotone. " I bet she'll keep cursing people, believing in some false god." she laughs " and that is so stupid. Some type of Romeo and Juliet but in dark mode."

"Oh," I reacted. That sentence makes my skin boil. I don't like people talking shit to my friends. My only friends who listen to me. No one is allowed to talk like that. " She surely will curse you to death if she heard that."

"That totally scares me," she says, stepping backward as she crosses her arms. " A loser trying to beat me? Trying to beat high castes like me? Hah." She flips her hair that puts in place on her back. " unbelievable. I bet she couldn't even try to touch me or even talk straight to me."

This conversation is taking too long. Is she seriously not getting tired of this? There's no reason to have this type of talk. Every second that has passed by, I wished this would end and proceed to another new day.

" wait wait wait. Let me get this straight." Floch steps in spreading her arms to stop this quarrel between me and Queen Bee. " High castes? What—what the fuck that's supposed to mean?" He looks at her with his pressed eyebrows together. He looks confused as hell. Like trying to understand a sentence in a different language.

" It's not of your business, Flo—"

"Oh, I see." Queen Bee cut me off. " it's discussion time." She clasps her hands together. " Shingeki High has divided into several groups." She walks back at forth in front of us. " the nerd, the jocks, the preps, goths." She paused as she stays at the middle " and... the two major dividers were the low and the high castes." She spreads her arms open. " as simple as that. He belongs to the low ones and..." she points at herself by putting her hand on her chest " I belong to the high castes."

Her pride is sickening me.

"Speaking about school." She continued " tomorrow is going to be my first new day." She left with a relief voice. "Can't wait to see my dear friends again."

" New day for another new troubled life," I said way too seriously. And I bet she gets it. She knows what is up with her in school. Surely.

That day was been complicated. Many things happened. Many things make me think that this is a dream. I couldn't believe what just happened, like walking to a lonely street that has so many directions or ways to decide which one you're going to. And the end of its pathway, that's what where your life goes. Good or bad. It felt like that.

Queen Bee will always be the most mysterious person that I met. What is her goal? What makes her a "Queen" that what she was really proud of. Queen Bee will always be my stranger. I don't know her. I don't know anything about her. Like a missing file in a computer that you really want to find.

~~~~~

" Eren!" Mikasa called me when I enter the entrance gate. " Good Morning!" She greeted me as she holds my hands and pulling me forward towards our building. " I've been so worried about you yesterday. You didn't even message or call me. What happened? Is there something wrong?"

My mouth remained shut for that question. Her eyes were searching for my answer. The tension of her hands on my palms wants me to answer the question. And I couldn't do anything. I can't tell her. Especially to a person who she hates the most.

Queen Bee just walked by in front of us with her friends. Probably Ymir, Hitch, and Marlowe. She acts like nothing happened yesterday. And there she noticed me looking at her. She smirked and winked her eye.

" Eren?" Mikasa called " what happened to your lip?" She looks closer." it looks like a little red spot. But it's not that bad."

I switched my eyes to her as I reach my hand on my lower lip. And there's a slight pain on it that making me remember what happened to it.

The curtains were closed that there's no inch of light to be seen. The doors were locked and the whole dining area feels hot. Full of sweat and heat. But that type of feeling was different from the ordinary one. It's good but bad at the same time.

She sits over the table with her legs wrapped around to my back. Her arms were on my shoulders pulling me closer to her. With these closed eyes, I could feel the heat through her sweaty skin on her waist. Her heartbeat beating fast like a drum that all you could feel was thirst.

My lips still sting in pain from her teeth when she bit it. If this goes on, you won't feel it. You'll feel something else in which you can be satisfied without knowing.

She grabs my neck. Kissing me deeper into my mouth. She loses her breath that makes me pull back. We both panted heavily, swallowing so much air. She traces my bare chest with her fingertips and complimented " you have no muscle" she says softly, almost like a whisper. And that, making me nervous more.

She leans in, slowly making soft kisses to my chest. Slowly up to my neck. My nerves jolt as I realized, she founded my sensitive spot. " ticklish?" She asks as she looks up to me.

" N-no.." my voice stuttered. Obviously lying to her.

" hey eren." She whispers as she licks my sensitive spot that made my spine shiver. " Let's make a deal." She whispers and looks up to me. " Be my servant." She puts her both hands on my jaw, pulling them down for me to focus on her. " you need money, right?"

Money. When I started living here all by myself, I always wished to have more money to be able to help my mom, myself, and my studies. If I have enough money, my mom would not suffer anymore. She'll be here if I had a lot of money. My mom. She's very important to me.

" I'll pay you thousands every month." She says.

That's more than I get being a counter boy at seven eleven.

" if you get my orders, you'll have the money." She gets closer to my face as she looks at my lips. I licked them as I slowly move back but her hand was blocking from behind " and..." she says " let's make this a secret, yeah?"

"Y-yeah..." I didn't think. And I agreed. " w-why me..?" I asked.

" Just trust me." She says. " And I know you'll going to love it." A breathless whisper.

I lean into her, going for another kiss. Pulling her down to the table. Pinning her down, roaming my hands all over her body. As she embraced her arms behind my neck. Tugging her legs on my back. With my full clothe bottom, I could feel my crotch touched her part. Moving forward as she tightens her legs to move even closer.

A servant who follows the Queen's order was now my duty. I didn't think, I didn't analyze. What if this will turn out to be the right thing?

" my lips were just chapped." I answered Mikasa's question. " don't worry about it, it doesn't really hurt, actually" Mikasa didn't believe me. She looks way more concerned than before.

From afar, Queen Bee looks back at me with a smile of something else.

Today is going to be another new day.

To be continued...

January 21, 2019, 12:27 am


	5. First Kiss

People may think it's getting weirder and weirder day by day. Every time the time passes, the ticks and tocks that run every second, every minute, days, or weeks it's getting to have an unusual seeing.

Every time I stepped inside of my campus, it is the start of me being an automatic machine. She's the one controlling me, the holder of the gamepad. She's been pressing several buttons for me to cooperate with her. She's the boss that her orders were the most annoying part. Get this and that. Do this and that. That phrase keeps repeating in my head that I might turn into a paranoid.

" I'll pay you a thousand, cool?"

She promised me that day. I'm doing this is not because I want to be with her, it's because of the money that she'll give me. I mean, everybody can do anything with money, right? You can do everything you want with it. It's like you'll become the most powerful person if you had one. And I'll get to that point. Not this day yet.

"Who is that guy?"

"Why is he with the Queen Bee?"

"I'm getting confused, do you think he's something else to her...?"

Rumors easily spread everywhere. Like a poisoning virus.

Those rumors will never stop. It'll never be. It keeps on going and going like a small crack on the wall that keeps flowing more water that becomes a flood of toxic-ness. Flood of words. Flood of false stories. Flood of gossips. Some are so stupid. Some of them are not true at all. Let's just keep their imaginations wild. Wilder than the animal.

The halls went very busy. Running around with their squeaking tennis shoes, Friends formed into several groups, the chattering of voices filled the whole area. The closing and opening of the lockers still feel like yesterday.

I went to my locker place. Placing my backpack on the ground for a while as unlock my locker. 4436 that's my passcode. The only thing you'll see inside of my locker was a whole package of unnecessary things. In short, it's all trash. Used white t-shirt, probably when I used it in my PE class, crumbled papers, sticker notes that were my reminders on the side, and not arranged books and my notebooks. Just like a normal student would do right?

I sighed as I knock off the books on my way and get all that I need this day. Science, Math, and English. Another boring session with another annoying teacher.

" Hey."

It gave me a few seconds to process until I realized that someone was calling me. I wonder who it was. I closed the locker and looked at the other side.

That's rare. I saw Bertolt the "messenger" was leaning against the locker. Looking at me suspiciously as he crosses his arms to his chest. He's surprisingly tall. Taller than me. He also had a thin structure body type " I heard something" his voice was deep. " you keep following her around. Like a dog who follows its master. So probably you are one of them then."

" what are you here for?, Bertolt." I know this guy. He is Reiner's messenger. Queen Bee's ex-boyfriend.

" Have you heard?" He spread his arms " everyone was talking about you. A loser hanging out with a Queen. Think about that. Everyone wants to be with Queen Bee. And lucky you, she allows you to be with her. You're like the luckiest person alive here in Shingeki High."

" I'm doing this is because she orders me to," I said

" Like a fellow dog as always..." he smirks. "Oh yeah, I almost forgot. You're new here. Am I right?"

He's asking me so many questions. And I know there's a purpose behind it. Could it be possibly be linked to Reiner? I think it's true.

" I am," I answered without hesitation.

" a newbie I see..." he nodded his head, thinking what to say next. " You know... I want to know a lot about you. If your mind... let's be friends, yeah?" He offers me his smile.

That's the fakest smile I ever saw. I don't even trust him. Never. I pressed my eyebrows together, raising my eyebrow up. " I—uh.." I felt a sudden awkwardness.

The school bell rings and the first session will begin any time sooner. Before I said anything, he takes my hand and shook it, making a handshake. " Eren, thank you so much."

I literally said nothing. He gets weirder and weirder. " Can I have an interview with you? You know... as friends?" He says, getting his wallet from his pocket pants and offers me a small piece of hard paper. His phone number was written there " call me if you're ready." He smiles and starts to walk away as nothing happened.

What was this guy want to know about me?

~~~~~

Science class. The first subject this afternoon. Apparently, I wasn't listening to what all my professor just said. I sat there, getting my notebook, turns the page to the very last, and makes scribbles of words and sketching aliens.

" Can I have an interview with you?"

I feel like everyone was targeting me. I'm like the bull's eye. Higher castes were kept on eye on me. Every time I walk along the hallway, they would stop whatever they were doing and starts to stare at me, hiding a secret message to the sense of their eyes. It's like no one is trusting me with Queen Bee. Was it because of me being with Queen Bee that much?

No. We're not something else. It will never happen. She makes a deal and I have no other choice but to accept it. Money. The money is the reason I am doing this.

The archer that would hit me will be Bertolt. He may be nice on the outside, but he'll always be the opposite inside. I really hope that the arrow will not hit me in the bull's eye.

My phone vibrates as I received a message from Queen Bee.

" meet me cafeteria this lunch break. Thanks xoxo"

"Right."

I sighed. I never thought that this Queen Bee would be so bossy all the time. And I know I have to no right to demand this, because I accepted this challenge.

~~~~~

" Mr. Smith was the worst," Mikasa says as we walked along the hallway. She was holding her black book. Which, I guess her "gothy" book of spells where she was most interested.

" He keeps calling my name. I'm not even bothering him. I was just sitting there listening to his whatever he was saying" she groans " Ugh, he's so annoying."

" Teachers are just being teachers" I look at her. She looks completely upset about it. " it's their own instinct. Their job was to keep all the teenagers get irritated by him." I nudge her arm " it's short" I whispered, " they're horridly like monsters."

She lets out a soft laugh " oh you..."

" I swear to god in the future" I smirked " you'll surely give them a bad blessing or uhm spells or whatever" I went stuttered there.

" oh, I will be" she marches down the hall, like a pride little witch as always " I'm a witch after all."

That's what I just thought.

" by the way Eren." She stopped and twirls around to face at me.

"Hm?"

" There's a school party this Friday." She says " You know... Armin, Bertolt, and I wanna join. How about you? Wanna come? It'll be more fun if you join us."

Parties. I'm not really into that kind of stuff. Loud music makes me sick. People dancing around the dance floor gets me really annoyed. People will look at me. Staring and starts to think something about my being.

Judgment. I hate being judged by other people.

But, Mikasa was my friend. She offers me an invitation to join her. She's been always inviting in moments like this and I always answer it with a "no" why? Because I don't want to be with people. Especially the ones that I don't know, typically strangers. I'm not that friendly. I think I'll never be.

Now, I can't just refuse that invitation am I?why? because she's the only friend that I got. The one I trusted the most.

This includes one of my opportunities. I can't waste that.

"Sur—"

" Eren! Oh thank god I found you"

Someone interrupted us. I came to look behind. And just as I thought, Queen Bee was there. She walks towards me, almost like she's in a fashion show. Hitch was behind as well as Marlowe which is right beside her. Every time I'm in the middle of my conversation with someone, she comes and there it stopped. Like an annoying housefly that you badly want to spray it with anti-bug spray.

" what do you want?" I said, realizing that I said it in monotone.

She didn't answer. Instead, she smiles and grabs my hand " we need to discuss something, yeah?"

I was about to answer but she pulled me over with her as she harshly walks with me along the hallway. I came to look for Mikasa behind. She was standing there with confusion on her face. I already know that she's not going to believe what she was seeing right now.

Mikasa. I'm sorry.

~~~~~

" A servant I see." Hitch softly chuckles, leaning her chin against her clasped hands as she puts her elbow against the table. " You'll discover a lot. I mean... a whole lot of things."

We were currently sitting at the center of the cafeteria. Where only higher castes were allowed to sit. Well, until now... I still couldn't believe I'm here with them. I'm with the lower castes' enemy.

It feels like you're in a lifeboat. The rest will be people drowning down to the deep ocean. Ignoring people craving for help, but you can't do anything unless the Queen says something. I'm just a fellow dog who follows master's orders.

"Shut up, you dum dum." Queen Bee snapped. " it's not a part of your business. You have your own servant and you shall..." she paused as she pointed her hands to them " Be with your servant. If you know what I mean." She says in a sassy tone.

Hitch has a servant? Who could it be? Could it be that every high castes members has their own servant? I still don't know why they need to have one. Was it because of the school? What about because of Queen Bee herself? She literally rules everything in metaphorical way.

" Oh my my Queen." Hitch just said. " don't get me so embarrassed with this young fellow in front of me" she refers to me and I don't have a right to demand her. " Besides he's the new one after Reiner right?" She smirks.

" Don't ever mention that name to me." She says. There's a little bit of boldness of her voice. She's trying to forget all about him, Reiner. Even though I don't exactly know what's the main cause of their breakup, I can still tell she doesn't want to be with him anymore, even though she has, I believe she had a little, even a smallest bit of feelings.

" What's going on here, my ladies..?" Jean appears as he walks towards us as if he was the main character. Slick back hair as always, trying to impress all the girls in front of him. He puts his hand over our table and puts his other hand on his waist, posing in front of the queen.

" oh my you bad boy..." Queen Bee says in a sassiest way. " there's no need to be concerned around me. And thank you I really appreciate that." She claps her hands.

Jean smiles at him as his eyes roams around and stop until he met mine. He raised his eyebrows. I know he's surprised. "Oh. The loser is here" he says

I nod as a response.

" My servant." Queen Bee says. I jolted until I realised that her hand is on my shoulders. She put her head on my shoulder.Shit shit shit. I couldn't move an inch. Feeling like I was trapped in a super glue rat trap. And there, my heart starts to race up. I can't make an eye contact on other people, even on Jean. Shit. Shit. Shit. Everyone is fucking staring at us right now. Fuck fuck. Make this stop. " isn't he lovely?" She says, fucking teasing me.

" whatever you say, your majesty" Jean says, looking away from us. I can tell. He doesn't give a fuck about us. A split second, he looks at me and mouthed " be careful..."

Huh?

" Have you guys heard about the school party?" Jean changed the topic. " let's go together yeah? I'll bring the soda and some pepper and cheese nachos."

" hm..." Queen softly laughs. " you said that exactly just one year ago." She leans against the table. " and..." she paused and looks at me with a smirk on her face " your invitation is granted" she tells Jean. " and of course with Hitch and her servant as well."

" oh my, your majesty" Hitch says " I always come with you all the times yeah? Am I right, darling?" She faced to her Servant. Which was revealed to be Marlowe all along. Without any hesitation, Hitch leans on him, putting her arms around his neck, kissing him deeply.

" Jesus Christ!" Jean almost shouted " get the fucking room you dumbasses!" Jean literally jumped out of the table.

Watching them in front me, remembers me what happened in the apartment. Her arms on my thin back. Her tongue inside of me. Her soft skin. Taking small kisses on my bare chest up to my neck. As she rustles my dark hair, letting our hottest breaths in an isolated room.

My hand grips on my knee. Looking down on my lap, hoping that I don't get a boner. Why did I think of that? Fuck. A total fuck shit.

" Hey Eren.." that totally jumped me. Queen rustles something on her bag. Gives me her notebook, which was glittering in pink. Totally girl stuff. " I have an assignment in there. She says. Do it for me, okey?" She smiles, as if she was forcing me to say yes.

" I-uh"

" Great!" She cheerfully says as she kisses my cheek. But, she stopped on my ear and whispers " come with me at the school party yeah?"

I am a servant. Who follows master's orders for money. " yeah..." I cleared my throat " alright...".

And I agreed...

~~~~~

I haven't seen Mikasa since that time. I was looking for her. I went to her classroom but she was not there. I keep looking at every corner but there was nowhere to seen. I wanted her to listen to me or even understand me about earlier. I know from the look of her eyes, she was not satisfied especially when I was with her. With Queen Bee herself with her whole existence.

In the situation like this, I am going to be with her starting this day. I meant, "following" the queen before the throne of the castle. I know Mikasa doesn't want me to be like this. As for myself, I'm doing this for my sake. I hope she understands me more.

She's my friend.

My only friend.

" don't tell me..." Mikasa slowly shook her head. " you're her..."

" yes Mikasa." Without any hesitation, I answered without lying. " I was her servant."

"No.." this time she furrowed her eyebrows together, gripping her hands against the hem of her black skirt. " B-but why?" She says spreading her arm. " why would you do that to a person who you hate the most?"

Hatred. The word hate was not the right word. It's not like I really hate her. It's just that I really dislike her for who she really was. We're not friends. Never. That will never happened.

Hatred. No. Not hatred. Or maybe.

" Because..." I ran out of words. " She offers me a deal, Mikasa"

" you're stupid!" She nearly stump on her feet to the ground " you're crazy!" She shouted " do you even know what you're doing? Queen Bee wasn't a good person. She betrayed people. She makes all things not possible. She plays with us! With the lower castes! Do you know what happened to Isabel the time she kicked out of this school?"

"Isabel?" I questioned myself. Who was she?

" everyone thought that she's the one who set one classroom on fire. Even the faculty stuff believed in that." She slowly walks towards me. " you know who really did that?"

I didn't respond.

" it's her. Queen Bee." She whispered. " she's has an evil spirit in her. And I don't want to happened again, may be to you—"

" Mikasa" I said. And that made her dead silent realising that my voice went bold and deep. " I appreciate that you really care for me." I said " but I think for me it's too much."

Mikasa snapped her head up, looking straight at me with hidden confusion on her eyes. " Eren no..." She said immediately " I'm telling you the truth—"

I was dumb.

"This was my decision, Mikasa." I said "I'm sorry. I have to do this for myself. You don't have to blame me. If something happens, it was my choice, and I'll blame myself for it."

~~~~~

"Hey Eren, ya alright?"

I blinked my eyes several times that the music snapped out of my ears. The beat of the music vibrates against the coach that I was sitting. The flashing of several colours of light, dancing through the air. People we're dancing around the gymnasium.

That's right, the school party has started.

" You seem to be staring at an empty dimension there, buddy" Jean pats my back massively but in a friendly move way.

" uh—yeah." I positioned myself " I'm alright.."

I honestly, I'm not that one hundred percent okey. I've been think how I encountered Mikasa back in the campus two days ago. After that, Mikasa was been avoiding me that makes me so uneasy for myself. Many questions were roaming inside of my head. Did I do something wrong to her? Did I said something bad that offended her? There must be.

The only friend I have, I wished she'd stay with me.

" here have some" Jean offers me a bottle of sprite, but there's an orange gold liquid inside of it.

" what's this?" I questioned him.

" why won't you give it a try?" He says as I grab it and takes a gulp.

It was cold. A little bit sugary but there's bitterness against my tongue. " shit, what is this.."

" relax relax..." Jeans sits beside me " I wasn't trying to poison you, alright?" He offers me another gulp and without thinking I shove it on my mouth, drinking almost half of it.

" it's Jack Daniels. Everyone loves Jack Daniels, right right" he repeatedly punch my forearm.

My head went very light as if all of my problems were suddenly vanished in mid air. My muscles feels soft like a mashmellow that all I want was to lay down and watch the girl strip in front of m—

" you brought" I laughed as I faced to him " Jack Daniels" I raised it up. " to this motherfucking school you fuckin—"

"Shh" He just shushed me. Which is not nice not all. " Shut up, you prick! If some officers know about this, were in big trouble there, buddy."

I laughed at his answer " genius."

" and you're drank the half of it." He shove the bottle to him and check if there's still more. " dangit, Eren now you dead drunk. Just one freaking bottle. What are you? An innocent child? Hah. Good for you."

" Want more!" I almost shouted. But I think I shouted in front of him.

" Jeez, since when you get this oppressive."

Jean left me to get the other bottle of "sprite". I put my head back to the head of the couch as I lay my arms on top of it on each side. The music slowly gets louder to my ears. The beating of the sound slowly gets stronger and stronger that vibrates to the floorings.

Someone just sat beside that the springs below the couch makes a little bounce. " Enjoying?" She says in a gentle voice.

I blinked as I slowly lift up my head and look the person who just literally sat beside me. Queen bee. I suddenly forgot what she just said. " How come there's two Queen Bees?"

" what?" She laughed " Eren are you alright?" She leans closer to me. Putting her hands on my shoulder looking to my eyes very closely that takes her a few seconds before she slowly rustles my hair by her soft hands. " Eren" she called " I didn't know you have such beautiful eyes." She says softly.

" my eyes?" I whispered. " what's in them?"

" it's like the colour of the sea with emerald jewels in them."

The moment when I saw her face, the world suddenly stopped as if everything went in slow motion. Even though its dark that the only flashing light were seen, I saw her eyes. Light diamond eyes. On the other side, I saw her hair. It was a little bit curly but in a very neat way. Her red rosy lips and her sparkling dress. She puts her hand over my chest, feeling my heartbeat. And I think, it's getting faster and faster as she slowly leans in to me, looking to my lips.

... she's damn gorgeous...

But, I sense something. No. Someone. I looked behind Queen Bee to see what it was. When I looked it was a blur, I mid closed my eyes to focus. And that, I saw Mikasa staring back at me with the most worried eyes.

" Mikasa..." I said it in the air.

Mikasa looks away and starts to walk away from the distance. God. No. Please don't go—

" woah woah what's the business here?"

Queen Bee leans back after she heard the voice, which was revealed to be Jean holding his bottle of "sprite"

Jean offers me the bottle. This time, I don't think I'll give another drink after what I just saw to Mikasa. I want to talk to her. I want to be with her right now. I want to apologise. I just...I just want to see her like I haven't saw her in years.

Jean stand on top of the table. And takes a deep breath " Everybody!" He cupped his hands " Let's play a game where everybody is included!" Jeans gets the sprite that I drank earlier as he drinks the half until it gets empty. " Let's play the most famous party game of all time!" He raises the bottle. " Truth or Dare!"

The crowd suddenly cheers. That sound I'm hearing, makes me uncomfortable. I'm not really not used to hear this loud noise. I'm just a person who likes with a few people, since that this is from the school invitation, I have to go. And here I am, sitting like I'm afraid of everything. No, I don't think that was the right answer. Maybe because Queen Bee ordered me to. I am a servant. Queen Bee's servant, who follows every master's orders.

" Queen Bee!" Hitch called her in a rising tone. Well, Marlowe can't be cut off beside her, right? He's always with her. Like... always.

" let's talk." Her tone of her voice sounds very serious. Without any reply from Queen Bee, she stands up and followed Hitch where she was supposed to go. And I'm here left out with the bad boy Jean.

" Let this game started!" Jean spins the bottle. It spins so fast that you can't even see the form of the bottle. Jean jumps over the couch beside me that I almost fell because of the big bounce. Jean must be a heavy weight young man.

" Jesus Christ Jean" I hissed

" looks like you're still drunk." Jean looks back at me with a cheeky smile. " I hope that bottle stops on you. I have so many questions to ask about you."

" you wish..." I answered.

The crowd cheers as the bottle continuously spinning around the table. My ears were full of shouting voices calling a certain name that hope it'll stop on them. The bottle slowly and slowly stops on...

Sasha Blouse. The Floater.

" What the fuck? Me?" She said in a cracky voice with a very high pitch tone.

" oh oh oh oh!!" Jean cupped his hands on his mouth and shouts " Sasha fucking Blouse! Truth or Dare!"

The crowd literally only shouts Dare. Fuck my ears. My eardrums were probably exploded by now.

" Since everyone was shouting dare. I'll choose truth!"

" Fucking Blouse!" Someone suddenly shouts out of nowhere. The crowd laughs that spreads the whole area. Fucking god. What's wrong with this people.

" Alright alright" Jean stands up and lowering his arms to the settle everyone out. " I'll ask you."

Sasha stand up from her seat as if this was a competition of pride. " Bring it on" she crosses her arms.

" are you a virgin?"

She went silent. With that silence, the crowd starts gossiping to one another. Spreading words that Sasha doesn't want to hear. With the looks on her face right bow, I don't think she really cares about it anymore. " what if I say yes?" She asked " are you going to fuck me or something?"

The voices of the crowd went like an "ooh"s and " dang"s on their mouths. The a gigantic tsunami that can be crushed by someone else's feelings. Jean's face, that is obviously a shock expression right there.

An interrupted laugh was encountered. " dangit, your face!" Sasha tears of joy starts to show that makes her stomach ache from laughing. " I'll be honest here alright" She says. " I'm not.." she says smirking.

Jean stands up from his seat and grabs the bottle. " I guess Connie make that happened." Jean says teasingly. I already know by the look of Sasha's face, furrowed eyebrows, pouted lips, crossing arms. She's definitely so done with him.

Sasha may be a laugher but, she sometimes gets tired of people using her as a comedy type show. She isn't like that. She can do whatever she wants but not being used her body to people.

That's what I learned from her from the past months. And I still remember at first day of school, she's the only one of the high castes that I didn't recognise. And Finally today, I get to know her more.

" alright alright" Jean picks the bottle and start spinning in around. I watched the bottle turning around and around as I keep my eyes wondering around the crowd. Looking at everyone's faces. But then, my eyes suddenly stopped when I saw Mikasa just sitting across me, with her face facing towards the ground and her hands kept closed against her knee.

I know I made her like this. I wasn't thinking. I keep doing things without analysing what is going to happened next. Could it be good? Or the negative one? And right now, I think it turns out to be the negative one.

I want to talk to her about earlier. I keep on hoping that she would look at me and give her a sign to go somewhere else to talk. I was just trying to keep my best friend back to its originality.

I hope she understands to me.

" Eren!" Jean suddenly shouts that jumps the hell out of me.

And there I just realised that the bottle was pointing towards me. Well, fuck. There's nothing I can do now.

" Finally finally finally..." Jean just said the same word thrice. I can see that people wears the bored face as always when the topic was all about me. I'm not that interesting... I'm just a regular boring person.

" have you kissed someone yet?" Jean says immediately

" You didn't even ask me truth or dare!" I almost shouted that everyone makes an awkward look towards me.

" My my..." he clicks his tongue " an aggressive lower castes as always..." he says in a suddenly different tone from earlier. " you lower castes doesn't have a right to reject what the higher castes will say, alright?"

That tone made my body feel steady as fuck. I've never felt this before. Was it... embarrassment? I think so since that people were dead quiet.

Mikasa... when Jean called my name, she puts her head up now looking at me.

" Have you kissed someone?" He smirks. And I already know that he was an expert eye secret reader. Since that Queen Bee become me as her servant, he may expect that something happened between us.

And that made my heart race in panic. That memory was still on my head that her hands touched my rusty skin. Our smell hot and sweaty. Every moan, every breath, and each kisses still makes me have severe goosebumps. And that not understandable feeling with her was still unknown inside of me. But, every moment of it I somehow want to do more.

Fuck I'm drunk.

" well, do you?" Jean asks again.

" let's make this a secret, yeah?"

" n-no.." I said in a stuttered voice after I remember what she just said, gladly in was recorded in my head. "Never..."

He lets out a heavy sigh. Lifting his arms and cross it to his chest. His eyes were on me, easy and steady. I know that he already knew that I was lying. He was indeed an expert to read who's lying or not. " so you're lips is clean as a virgin then. How sad..." he said, as if he has mercy on me. " you can't die like a virgin, am I right?"

With that, I could hear the crowd laughs and gossips that fills my ears. I know this recent days, every time I was with Queen Bee I felt like all the snipers were targeting me from the distance. And if I flinch or move a single bit, they might kill me.

" let's give him a chance!" Someone's just shouted.

I followed his voice and looked. Surprisingly, it was Connie sitting just a few meters away from me. He sits with his legs and arms on the top of the coach open. And of course Sasha was just little sitting on top of Connie's left leg with her arms embraced around his neck. " the opposite of the bottle will be the one will kiss him. Sounds fair, right?"

The opposite of me?

I slowly looked to the bottle and follow its direction. As our eyes met to the other side.

Mikasa was looking at me.

" Oh come on!" Jean groan " not the love of my life—"

" alright I accepted it." I said in a very bold tone. Which I didn't mean it at all. I stand up from my seat, ignoring all the faces that were looking at me. And I expect that their mouths were hanging open by now. "This lower caste isn't any like the others" they might think. To be honest, I'm just being myself.

Mikasa's eyes were locked on me. I grab her wrist and bring her with me to the place where nothing can distract us.

I hope she opens up with me.

~~~~~

We went over the other side, near the entrance and exit door. When I grab her wrist, I didn't even thought that "shit... she's finally here". That probably make my palms very sweaty.

" Eren, are you alright?" She says in the most gentle voice.

That make me so nervous when she's now in front of me. Thinking what I've done to her, I can't just simply feel like nothing is wrong. And now, there's definitely wrong with me.

I was selfish.

"I'm sorry" I said in a whisper. " I'm sorry for what I've done to you. I shouldn't have done that." I lose an eye contact with her. It makes me more embarrassed that I've been apologising like a little boy who accidentally hit someone's face. " you were right" I said, realising that I still hold her both wrists " you have a point. I should've listened to you because I knew that the Mikasa I knew was there beside me at all times..." when I called her name, I rise my head up to look at her face.

Her skin is always white. Dark red glossy lips she always wears, naturally long eyelashes, and her soft short hair that touches just above her shoulders. I've never look at her face this long before. Her dress was pure black that reaches to her ankles, pure white jewels hanging on her ears. She smiles. A concerned smile like I always saw whenever she looked at me.

This feels like home.

" since that day, I just keep thinking like what did I do wrong? Like... this is all my fault that I made you like this." I admitted. " and I always wished that you would always with me you know like I've made a mistake like I put bananas on your favourite salad and I know you hate bananas and..." I scratched my head " I mean... what I'm trying to say is..."

The tense atmosphere suddenly vanish when her laughs overcomes this feeling. Her soft laugh makes my body finally more relaxed than before. She massages my knuckles with her thumbs. " do you really think I would leave you like a poor little spirit who lefts by the dark devil?" She says as she smile remains on her face.

She holds my hands and pulls me forward towards the dance floor. " wait wait wait..." I literally tried to lock my feet on the ground to avoid going with her " what are we doing?" I asked liked a scared cat who doesn't like to jump over the bucket of water.

" we're going to dance!" She cheerfully says

" b-but I don't dance!" I stuttered, almost shouted because of this up beat music.

" neither do I!" She response.

When we stepped on the dancers floor, it feels like you're standing on a stage and everybody was watching. You can feel the beat on your chest that almost freak me out thinking that my beating heart will come out eventually without realising it.

Mikasa lets go of her hand from me and puts her both hands in the air. She closes her both eyes to feel the music and makes a sway movement to her hips and takes her foot to different directions. I have to say, she looks like she's having a great time. And I'm just here making awkward dance moves looking like an injured ugly duckling from the pond.

The music began so slow than before. It went from up beat to a very slow tempo. The flashing of light went to its rhythm.

Mikasa slowly puts her both arms above my shoulders. She's a bit taller than me because of her heels. I looked to her pure dark brown eyes as I put my hands on her waist.

She gazed down to my eyes as our foreheads touched each other. " you know, Eren..." she whispered as I listened to her very soft and gentle voice. " I know you haven't realise this yet..." she paused. " The moment I met you in this school, you changed me."

" what do you mean?" I questioned her.

" I was such a brat back then..." she says " people think I'm so weak that I can't stand on my own. They say that I need some baby walkers to walk on but... when I met you..." Her fingertips mets the back on my head, slowly rustles my hair. " you taught me how to be strong..." she chuckles " you taught me how to brave that I can fight those high castes bastards."

" they're just people" I respond

" I know..." she says " and that made me realise that I shouldn't have stopped you from what you're doing. I know who you are. You're not Isabel. You're Eren..." She slowly grasps my neck as she eyes went down looking at my chest. " The Eren who is very strong, fearless, and knows what is right or wrong. I was supposed the one apologising to you. I didn't know at first that you were a..." her voice went very soft after that " servant..." she continues.

I know she doesn't want this. To be me as a servant of Queen Bee. I hope she can finally realise that there's nothing wrong between me and Queen Bee. I want to tell her that everything is fine. But, I don't think she's going to believe me. I know her. And She knows me too.

" I'm your friend, Eren." She says finally looking at me. " I'm just worried and you know I care a lot about you."

" Thank you, Mikasa..." I said, surprisingly in a very deep voice.

She chuckles " your breath smells like alcohol..."

"Sorry..." I said, embarrassingly break the eye contact on her.

She laughs like a sound of brushing soft wind on my ears. She leans near to my face that I can already feel her breathing on my lip. Our noses slowly touched as we move on a small step, following the slow tempo of the music. She put her hand on my jaw, brushing her thumb on my cheek. She looks at me for a second and slowly gazed down to my lip. At a slow pace, she leans to my face until her lips met mine.

A soft kiss. Her soft and small lips. There is no hesitations and she goes for it. She moves her head on the other side to get a comfortable position. We closed our eyes as we slowly felt this small pleasure. Sweet and slow like a honey slowly running down to the trunk of a tree. A small sigh, a small breath, a small moan and every single of it was gratifying.

We part ways leisurely. I looked at her, thinking that it was impossible that Mikasa would do that to me. And now, she done it. Realising the dare that Jean was given to us was done but I think that's not the main point. She stood there, smiling at me. And I blinked, thinking that... she wasn't like this before. I wonder what happened.

My body suddenly snapped when I heard an argument at the background. I went unfocused towards Mikasa. I looked around behind her, spying where that argument came from.

From the distance, near the entrance, Queen Bee stood there with Hitch and Marlowe on her side while in front of her was Reiner and also and probably his servant, Bertolt. Seeing Queen Bee with the most merciful eyes that the tears glittering by the moonlight outside. While the enemy, Reiner was there with the eyes of the predator of a lion. I could see his nerves on the side on his forehead and down to his neck. His arm suddenly flashed as he grasp the arm of Queen Bee, forcing her to go outside.

" Eren?" Mikasa called.

A jolt of anger suddenly summons inside of me that make me fist clenched even harder. My heart beat beats faster than usual that I get this feeling of nervousness and pique. My body suddenly snapped as my feet dashed towards them with my clenched fist. My feet stomps towards the ground as I ran towards them and takes a leap and punched Reiner on the face.

Reiner takes a step back, protecting his cheek that I hit earlier. My hand stings afterwards that it feels like I broke my knuckles. Queen Bee stood there, shocked and I could see the little droplets of tears in her eyes. " Eren!" She shouts in relief.

" let's go!" I garb her wrist and we ran over to the exit of the gymnasium. We ran as fast as we could until our feet gets tired.

People may suffer with a lot of secret droplets hidden in their eyes. But, I'm not allowing anyone to do that in front of them.

"Let's escape from this reality" I whispered to her.

Especially to her. My first kiss I'll never forget.

To be continued...  
April 4, 2019


	6. I'm just a silly girl

" you're a freaking trouble maker!" She breaks it with a laugh " you fucker..." Her voice almost loses its sound because of her unexpected laughing sounds.

I panted as fast as I could as my lungs was begging for more. I landed my hands on my knees. Breathing so fast that I was so thirsty for air. I could feel the heat of my body rising up and thinking, what the fuck she's laughing about? I slowly straighten up my back as I put my hands on my back like a granny who just broke her spine. " are you okey?" That's The first question that I come up in my head after that incident.

" of course not, you idiot!" She's still laughing. " what? Do you expect me to just stand here watching you and not thinking what you just did to Reiner? That was hilarious!"

I'm a dumbass. Of course she's not okey. The moment I was standing a few meters away from her, looking to her eyes where there's tears ready to fall down to her cheeks. The unexpected loud voice come out from Reiner's throat, the veins pop out through his arms and the side of his forehead, it shows that he was the predator of another predator who was weak and scared.

I can't just watch there and wait what's going to happened next. To be honest, I don't know what to do that my body did what it was supposed to do. I wasn't thinking straight. I wasn't analysing the situation. This feeling of rage that made me want her and I escape from this place.

" I saw you..." I said, very concerned. " and that guy" His name stings to my tongue. " why the fuck he still sticks with you?"

She embraced her chest and just smiles at me. Few seconds later, she shook her head looking to the ground. " I don't want to talk about it..." she says in a weak voice. " he's a dickhead." She totally hates him now.

And I'm here still wondering, after what he just did to her, does she still have feelings for him until now? I am inexperienced to those type of things. I just want to know... why is she still want to be with him after what he had done? Is this what love works?

She walks towards the porch of her house which was gigantic white mansion with so many glass windows. I looked around and I noticed that there's a small garden just in front of the porch. When I looked one of the windows, it was surprisingly very dark and hoping nothing's going to appear there that I might have a shit on my pants.

The door creaks when she opens it and echoes inside. " my dad's not home" she says and the sound of her voice bounces on the side, to the tiled floorings and to the ceiling with a gold sparkling chandelier hanging on top.

"shit..." I was wowed.

" follow me" she says and noticing she was holding three bottles of wine. " we're going to have a lot of fun tonight..."

My eyes was trying to become a night vision to this very dark area. And then, I followed behind to this one curved stairs. Every step we make, it makes me more nervous thinking that what if somebody is here?

And finally, we're on top as we walked to this long hallway. Thankfully, there's one light that looks like a hanging lamp from the distance. " so..." I break the silence " you and your father live in this house?" I asked, hoping it's not a very private question.

"Mm-hm" she answered as she walks to the hanging lamp reveals to be that there's a door beside it. She opens it and steps inside as well as I am.

" welcome to my bedroom..." she say tiredly as she puts off her heels by throwing it to her large creamy white cabinet. I take myself to look around.

Her bed was large that I think ten people can fit in. A mirror has a fancy design around it as I noticed my reflection. Damn... I look like a squatter.

Surprisingly she has literally books on her bookshelves even though I never knew that she reads a lot of books. I guess she was a bookworm. On the other side, there's some of her pictures of her family.

Her dad was short with black night hair that his features totally matches her. Her Mom who was tall with long dirty blonde hair and has a petite body like hers too. Most of them was just the three of them but there's one picture of her with a young woman hugging her. She has long pure black hair, diamond blue eyes like her and it looks like she's hugging young Queen Bee who was wearing a big smile that I never saw one on her today.

" you have a sister?" I questioned. I heard her footsteps getting closer to me and stops just when she was right beside me. She takes moment to look at the picture and without looking at me, she offers me a glass of white wine with some ice on it.

" yes..." she says softly as I take a gulp of white wine. It was very strong and has so much bitterness. " My older sister, her name's Frieda..." she just said her name.

" where is she now?" I hope I didn't ask so many questions.

" she's with my mom." She says " at the countryside doing some..." she paused " Farm work like milking the cow, harvesting wheat, fruits, vegetables and planting them back later on. Wow... I miss those times. It's weird to say those things.." she takes a drink " my dad forces them to live here which is much easier than the countryside but... my mom doesn't want to leave the farm and as a result, my sister wants to be with her. So yeah.." she turns to look at me " here I am, for the last seven years of my life..." she puts down her glass and takes the picture frame to have a better look " I haven't met them in person for seven years... it sucks. All I could do was video calling on skype... but... I just want to sit beside them and tell them all the stories that I want to tell for ages..."

" At least you have your father with you." I said looking at her " my father sucks as hell, he has another family leaving me and my mom. And now, mom was working abroad for my studies and... it almost a year now and I didn't have any chance to meet her." I swallowed "I'm just with myself all the time..."

" we're practically just sad babies" she chuckles. She puts down the picture frame. That might be the starting point to know all about her. There could be secrets of why was she called as the " Queen Bee". I still think we're not that point yet.

She turns on her speaker just beside the picture frame. The music started playing and it becomes a chill vibe with slow beating sounds and catchy tones and melody.

"Flowers bloomed when he walked  
Angels sang when he talked  
I laid my head down on my pillow and I dreamed"

She sang with the tone as she rise her arms into the air, closing her eyes smiling as she sways her body through the melody. She rises up the wine bottle, spilling it to her wine glass. She hums not realising that the wine glass is almost full.

I can't help myself but to laugh " the fuck you doing?" I asked her walking closer to her. " oh shit!" The wine glass was full and spills down to the flooring and all she could do was to laugh to her unbelievable act. " don't move, dammit!" I immediately grasp her wrist that holds the wine glass. The wine keep spilling so all I could do was to lean in and takes a sip to avoid spilling more.

"Smile at him in your math class  
Strive for him to do the same  
Open your eyes and realize he does not know your name  
And he does not care to"

She puts down the wine glass as she takes my hand moving me to the center of her room and invites me to have a dance with her. She even brings the bottle of wine she puts it in her mouth drank it as she sings as if the bottle was the microphone

"Cause I'm just a silly girl in a stupid dumb old world  
I'm just a silly girl in a stupid dumb old world  
And he is perfect  
Unlike me"

The cheeks hurts from smiling a lot. I stand there, staring at her. Her face along to her cheeks and over her nose went rosey red probably because of the heat inside of the room. Her hair went messy and look sticky from her sweat. Right now, she doesn't really care how she looked right now. All what she want was to have fun and pretend that all of her problems suddenly dissolved in thin air.

She went closer to me, and she wears that smile on me. She holds my hands and place it on her waist.

"And how could I ever think that it was meant to be  
And how could I ever think that anything was made for me"

She sang the lyrics " ooh" And there, I offered her a twirl, raising my one hand up and twirls her around in front of me. My heart suddenly skips of how incredibly good she looks right now. I could smell her smell which smells like a fragrance of little daisy and lavender in the middle of the field.

Unexpectedly, she missed a step and fell over with her. I hold her hand as we bounced off over her bed with her under me. I heard her soft laugh as we landed. With this short silence, she looks at me for a second as if she was looking at every detail I have in my eye. My chest feels hard when I looked at her as if it was hard to breathe freely. My arms went fragile, keeping myself on top of her.

" is it weird that I usually sing that song when I have a big crush on Reiner?" She breaks it with a tiredly laugh "such a dickhead..." she said softly " and..." she slowly leans on to me. "I'm just a silly girl..." she said at the same time with the music in the background.

She keeps her arms behind her as her face was so near to mine. Her breath tingles against my bare-skinned face. The room went silent even though there's still music playing in the background but there is this feeling of tension between us. And I could possibly tell that I want this more than anything else.

My body jumped a little when I felt the tip of her tongue was brushing against my lips. First to my top lip, gently and slowly to the center to the left and to the right. Second to my bottom lip with same movement. She wets my lip and slowly giving me a gentle kiss with that sound after it. I let a sigh realising that my chest feels hard and was shaking. She gives me another one but more contact than the last time. " no.. no.." I whispered as I backed up and let myself down to the mattress beside her. I bit my lip.

" what's wrong?" She whispered back.

To be honest, I just can't handle this chest. It feels like someone is pressing so hard that I might pass out in front of her. Whenever I look at her I cannot control this feeling of some kind of nervousness or just afraid of something else. I don't want to offend her.

" you know, I saw you..." she continues. " When I was with you know... with someone..." she tries not to tell his name " You're with that goth at the dance floor" she gazed to me " you two looked like you're having fun. Especially when you kissed her..."

" shit.." I sweared.

" do you have feelings for her?" She asked me as if she was willing to hear an answer from me.

" I-I mean..." I went stutter " she's my friend..."

" oh come on..." she groans " are you serious? Are just going to friendzoned her?"

" I don't think she has feelings for me. Neither do I..." I said honestly with an awkward smile hoping that it was the right answer.

" girls doesn't want that, Eren." She advised me. She sits up and went closer to me gently touching my hair with her fingertips. Her eyes was so steady, focusing what she was doing and slowly making a twirl with her index finger on a few strands of my brunette hair.

" do you know why he shouted me back there?" Her voice was so soft that makes me think that this might be a big secret between us. " I called him a liar. As simple as that..." Her eyes were avoiding contact with me. " he doesn't like that. I mean... to be called like that. But... I mean... it's true.." she lets out a heavy sigh trying so hard to not cry in front of me. " Remember when I said that I saw him with another girl? And guess what... he was with that girl at the school party..." she furrowed her eyes together as she pressed her lip. That last word she just said makes a huge pain in her. She shakes her head, clearly not accepting what just happened. And there was tears flowing down from her crystal blue eyes.

" we're officially over..." she gazed at me wearing a smile of sadness. Her runny nose and eyes that full of pain slowly weakens me. I didn't see Queen Bee this sad before. This makes me now think that Queen Bee has feelings for people. She's just like a normal girl like us. " I'm just a silly girl..."

My hand touched her cheek as I wiped her tears away from her eyes. " Honestly..." I smiled, trying to make her feel better " I've never saw this side of Queen Bee before..." I admitted, " who are you really..?"

She chuckles as she slaps away my hand away from her. " what? You're trying to know my real name? Are you even my friend?"

"Well..." I straighten my back slowly make a gentlemen bow in front of her " I'm your servant after all..." I put my eyes up to her " what? Are you just going to stare at me?"

" first, you need to take care of your hand though..." she was referring to my hand that I used to punch that guy in the face. I just realized that was swollen that might turn into a massive bruise.

" oh yeah, your right. I might probably broke some small bones there. I'll just get some ice downstairs and probably give you som—"

" Historia..."

"What?" I totally missed out on what she just said.

She chuckles that suddenly lightens my chest. " My name's Historia Reiss..."

I have to admit. I waited for her to say her real name in front of me. The way she said it in that gentle voice makes me think that this girl might be a whole a lot different right now. I mean... I don't see Queen Bee right now. The girl in front of me was different. I think I want to know all of her stories.

" want to know a fact?" I asked her.

" what?"

" I already know your name from the day you've given me the card in the cafe" I showed her a prideful smirk.

She gives me a confused look " oh you dumo..." She finally realizes it.

I clicked my tongue " You silly girl..."

To be continued...  
Silly girl by Chloe Moriondo  
May 9, 2019


	7. I'm a dumb teen boy

It is clearly raining outside. The droplets pours down to the ground from the great grey clouds  
below the dark sky. I tightened my grip to the handle bars as I pedal my way across the road. I could feel the cold wind brushing across my soaked jacket that my body felt a shiver. I panted, trying to create some heat to warm myself up. I've heard in the news that today is going to have a heavy rain but I don't mind. Raining is really my favourite weather. It's very dark, it's cold you can stay all day in the bedroom with some hot coffee.

Today is Saturday which means today is a cashier boy day. That's right, my shift today well later, later at night. I have to stand before the cashier, greeting the customers while wearing this seven eleven cashier boy costume. Sheesh. At least I'm not the only one tonight, Floch is going with me.

The thunderclaps through the air as the lightning comes after by, creating a flash of bright white light at a second or less. I tightened my grip to the break hoping that I'm not going to fall off by this slippery road. I stopped by the gate, jumps off the bicycle, and leaving that bike in the rain, and probably come back when it finally stopped.

I ran towards my apartment door as I hurriedly find my keys in my pocket. The wind is getting stronger than my hood attached to my jacket places to my head as I stumble over at the same time controlling myself over by putting my foot forward. "shit..." I cursed when I felt a jolt of ice to my spine. I handled my keys as I hurriedly open the door and slam it back when I finally stepped inside.

My breathing hissed as I realized how wet I was. What's weirder is that the living room was beaming with light. Did someone break in? That's what I thought first. " Hello? Someone there?" My voice echoed through the hallway. I put off my jacket as I drop it just beside the doorway. Luckily the bathroom was just a few steps to get there to get some dry towel to dry me up. I pull over my white undershirt as I wiped my bare chest, my arms, and my back. " Mom is that you? Stop playing games already!" I chuckled at myself.

Mom loves surprises. Whenever she's back for over a year, she would surprise me by hiding at somewhere place where it's very obvious. I have to say, Mom's a terrible hider. It feels like a ten-year-old again. It's like it was your tenth birthday and Mom just jumps off somewhere else while there's confetti flying everywhere while holding a birthday cake. I miss those times with her.

I stepped out of the bathroom as I put my face towel over my right shoulder. " Mom?" I peeked through the living room where that's the only light that was switched on. My body suddenly stopped, my mouth opened, and my eyes glued at the person right in front of me sitting with legs crossed like a gentleman.

" Dad?"

" long time no see..." he showed a cheeky smile. " I'm so surprised when I entered your apartment."

" why-wh-how-what are you—"

" and I assume you ate a lot..." he slowly shakes his head while he steadies his eyes on me. " of cup noodles..." he crosses his arms to his chest even tighter.

After that sentence, I take myself to look around my room. There's literally a lot of empty cup noodles everywhere. On the table, to the sink, and down to the floor. I totally forgot how to throw them because of my busy days. I turn my eyes back to his "Uhm" My voice went croaky " y-yeah..." I scratched the back of my head. " I'll clean that later—"

" do you even know what's the main ingredient of instant noodles?" He says, after that the room went silent, waiting for me to answer his question. But, c'mon now. I don't know a single shit about that.

" the number E621." He answers confidently. " otherwise known as the monosodium glutamate. MSG. I believe you saw that acronym before ."

" oh, now you're giving me the facts?!"

" Even though they may taste delicious but they can harm your body system. In other words, that might activate your cancer cell and..." he shoves his hands to the air. " you die"

I rubbed my forehead down to my eyes annoyingly hearing those words from him. " for Christ sake" I mumbled. Since when he cares about me anyway? Leaving me and my mom and he'll just appear out of nowhere like batman? This guy is insane. " what are you even doing here?" I asked

"Paying you a visit." He says

"A Visit!?" I scoffes " that's ridiculous. I thought you finally had a beautiful life with your other wife. Visiting me is nonsense. You can't even visit my own mom."

" you're a Jaeger. Eren Flynn Jaeger." He says immediately, standing up from his seat and steps closer to me with that serious look. " That's why I came back for you." He shows me that cheeky smile. " We, the Jaegers are known to be the most successful doctors around the world." He paused as he pointed to my chest " and you will be one someday."

That makes me nervous now. I can't do that. I don't have the intelligence to be a doctor. I don't think I can succeed that easily. I can't. I definitely cannot do that.

" I went to your school earlier and talked to your principal." He says as he fixes his feet to have a better position. " I saw all your report cards and records. And I was surprised." His voice suddenly raises. He gets something from his pocket which was revealed to be a folded piece of paper. He opened it fold by fold and starts to read what was written in there. " Apparently, you had B on the major subjects. Especially in Math and Science. And overall, your grading is average." The last word made him stare at me like a bullet. " And you had detention once by cleaning the football field." He says immediately.

He lets out a heavy sigh as if this was the only biggest problem in his life. But, I think I'm the problem in his life. The problem of my existence. I wasn't supposed to be here. It was all an accident. His fake love to my mom and to his son, to me, was still the biggest hole in me.

He starts to hold the top most of the paper by his fingertips as he slowly tears it all the way down until the whole paper was made into small strips on the ground. This nerve wracking feeling is making me anxious. I already know he's already disappointed in me. On the actions I've done, I don't think I'll do it again after this. All I could do was to stare down at my bare feet as I clenched my fists together, hoping he'll not smack me or whatsoever.

" don't ever disappoint me, again." He says broadly.

His voice made me look like a slave. " T-this doctor thing..." I said softly without looking at him. " I don't think I can do it," I said honestly as I slowly gaze up to him. All I could see was his faced forward chest standing like the pride of a lion. " i-it's not my thing..." The way he stares frightens me.

" you're giving up on me now?" His voice came like thunder. He steps closer as he put his hands on both of my shoulders, slightly tightening his grips that I can feel his nerves. " the reason why I let you study this school is because of yourself. Think kid. I gave you this opportunity. You're lucky." He slightly shakes my shoulders. " I want to have you this future. It's for yourself. That's why you need to get better. Hah? Better, son."

Hearing those caring words made me think that I might not trust his man anymore. He's never like that before. He did this for money. If I'll become a doctor, the person who'll benefit more is him and nothing for myself. Money is power. That's what he thinks.

When I think about money, I always reminded me of him. My father. His trait possibly passed down on me. That makes me a Jaeger. And I hate it. His word of his made me carry like a massive rock placed on my back. That's when I thought that I have this responsibility that I don't like it at all.

A body structure just walked out from the kitchen holding two cups of coffee. He paused he stood straight as if he was the professional like a dad in this room. He looks at me and gives me a smile like a big brother would do. " Eren..." he says.

" Zeke's here too?" I looked back to him waiting for an answer. " why is he here? Giving me a visit? That's—"

" Since you've been all by yourself all the time and by observing these mess all around you..." he put both hands on his pockets and poses in front of me. " You need accompany—"

" What!?" I respond immediately "babysitting me? No!" That last word made Zeke jump a little. " I don't need it, dad." I let out a heavy sigh actually a frustrating sigh. " I'm fine really please..."

" Dad doesn't want you to struggle." Zeke finally says as he put the cups of coffee on top of the table. He fixes his glasses. " that's the reason why I'm here. You need a guardian. C'mon Eren... Dad's helping you, you can't just refuse that. You're young. You're still young."

I've never experienced to have this care from them. Zeke is not really fully my brother. What I can remember from him is when Mom let me live with him for a while and surprisingly I was so grateful for it. I really knew mom can't afford much to fed myself and that's why she let me be with this rich family where I can have whatever I want. But I refuse to have it. I want to be with my mother. She and I were enough for me.

" Zeke can be your Math and Science tutor." He says in a deep voice. " That can help you improve so that after high school..." he raises his hand in the air. " You can move to Germany and be with us. Sounds great, right?"

" How about mom?" I asked. I clenched my fist together after I remember what he did to my mother. My life was nothing without her. And I am not allowing anyone to hurt her again.

He looks at me with the same reaction as before. He bits his lip ad I noticed his hand was tensed inside those pockets. He looked down with a sigh, massaging the nose bridge. I can see his answers through his action. He doesn't want her. My mom.

" Bring her home."

He finally looked up to me.

" Bring her home please..." I said it in a fading whisper.

~~~~~

Tonight was quiet. In a slouch position, staring at the aisle for minutes, breathing in a normal speed, and circling my thumbs together. I've been thinking about moving to Germany. I mean, that's a very far place from home. For these months that have passed by, I always wished that time must stop for a second that the clock would freeze every timeline as I enjoy what I have today as if every minute and second I have was infinite. I don't want to waste every single days in here. Of course, the time will not freeze in reality. I just want to spend all of my time enough for me to become a memory.

But I keep asking myself. Should I or should I not go with my dad?

My dad's right. He gave me this opportunity to have this job and I can't simply waste that. But... will this help my emotions? My feelings as myself? Was I forced? I don't want to but this feeling made me think that this is what I must do.

What's more important right now is that... high school is not over yet. Things must keep on going on.

" So basically... your dad is a physician billionaire. Sheesh, dude" Floch was surprised. He's over the aisle sweeping over the floor. He's in charge today.

" yeah..." hearing the word 'billionaire' really disgusts me.

" Who's your dad again?" He stops sweeping the floor as he sets aside the broom and looks at me when he asked the question.

And all I could do was to stare at him with that 'seriously look'. " you've probably seen him already in a tv show." I rolled my eyes as I let out this heavy sigh

" your dad's a celebrity?!" He probably jumped himself as if I was a celebrity also. " That's so cool man. You've probably joined him in a red carpet show where... uhmm I dunno where every celebrity steps in right? And you've probably been in a jacuzzi with some hot ladies in bikini ya? And you drank all night with some expensive beer—"

" Floch no." I said it in a most tired-full voice. " It never happened like that. And please can we set aside that 'my father' talk? I hate him so stop it." I removed my seven eleven caps that somehow made me sweat and heavy in my head. Hearing that topic about dad adds up to my stress library in my brain. " He's selfish." I paused " he only thinks about himself."

The space between us becomes quieter than before. I looked down at my lap thinking about my brother but somehow with my father. He left earlier this morning and went to his workplace known as his 'hospital'. He is a really busy man you can already tell but these events just happened still surprises me. This is very rare. He probably forgot about mom.

We've got some serious family problems in my life but those years that have passed after that, I still don't think dad hasn't changed yet. When I asked about my mom earlier he didn't say anything. He went silent as if my mom was a stranger to him. This can't change then I suppose. But I really hope I could see my mom after these months that felt like years.

The door suddenly rings its bell hanging on the doorway. I immediately put down my feet to the ground and put on my seven-eleven cap on to my head even though it felt so heavy like weights. " Good evening maaaa—" my mouth suddenly hangs on open when I saw her face.

" Hey Eren" She smiles as she leans in the counter. It was Historia.

My body suddenly tensed up to heat. I immediately straightened my back, closed my mouth back ad I combed my hair back. " H-hey..." I cleared my throat.

" Oh miss three a.m girl. You're finally here..." Floch approaches us with his broom. " Well based on that clock." He pointed it with his eyes as she followed his gaze " you're 5 minutes late." He smirks.

" That doesn't really matter." She shakes her head. " I'm going to buy whatever I want." She teasingly says as she went to the one aisle to get some midnight snack as always.

And I forgot to mention. She's literally wearing pajamas with pink polka dots on. Yep... she's the same girl I met for the first time in the same place.

" yeah? Why won't you just buy Eren instead?" He mocked and he gives me that look.

I'm totally ready to punch this guy right now. " Fuck you" I whispered harshly.

Three minutes later, she came back with lots and lots of junk foods and bottled sodas and puts it on the counter table.

" Woah... what's the event?" Floch asks confidently. I'm guessing that he's totally flirting with her. I don't even care I just patch the items one by one without looking at them making a conversation. They continued their talk as if I was invisible in front of them.

" Hmm, just a sleepover party that's all." She answers. " My friends were there so yeah..." she leans in one arm by the side of the counter. " You can come if you want."

Wait... did she just invited him?

" you're inviting me?" Floch's voice suddenly rises from excitement. " Holy shit—"

" yeah I mean.." she raises her shoulders " everyone invited."

" That will be 125 dollars, ma'am.." And just in time. I cut them off.

" you know... Eren's been down lately."

I see what you're doing. " Floch—"

" What's wrong?" She looks up to me as if she really cared about me.

That gaze and those eyes made me stare for a long time. She does have those beautiful eyes, those angelic sky blue eyes made me lost that the things around me slowly vanish in the air that only her and I were only here. I suddenly felt my body wracking from this tightness feeling on my chest.

She leans over the counter and put her both arms on the back of my shoulders, embracing them. This made my hair on my arms stood up with this contact. She closes her eyes and leans closer until our lips touched again.

It was soft and quiet but sweet. It feels like warm milk that you feel this warmth against those soft lips. It was gentle but every moment of it was incredible.

We part ways of leaving that sweet smile whenever she's looking at me. And I was there standing, looking shocked as hell. Literally, my whole body was frozen that all I could do was to stare at her.

And I thought that she's so...Gorgeous. I think... I might... I'm totally... fell in love with her.

" I hope that'll make you feel better..." She says as she put out the bill and takes my hand very gently and puts the bill on my palm and whispers " Keep the change..." She smiles again as if she was forcing not to laugh in front of me.

And all I could do was to smile. A weak smile like she completely destroyed me with that gentle kiss.

" See you later..." She says picking up the baggage and left the store.

This feeling was unknown to me. I didn't felt like this before. It feels like you're a child again felling in love with a grown woman celebrity or something like that. And whenever I saw her... her face especially her eyes it made me want to stay with her forever. I don't care what the others will say I just want to be with her. Holding her hand and kissing her.

It's something I dream of, something I want to feel over and over again. It's her. It's all because of her.

" Dude..." Floch was shocked " Holy Lord dude what was that?" He taps my shoulder trying to get my attention on him.

And I was just there standing looking staring at the glass door where she went to. I can't help it that my heart doesn't stop racing whenever I look at her. I want to see her again over and over again. I think I'm—

" Dude you're lovesick"

I laughed. A nervous laugh. To be honest, I don't even know what to do next. I didn't really expect that to do that in front of me especially when there's people around. When I turn around I accidentally hit Floch in the face

" Oh shit Floch—"

" Argh seriously man." He steps back giving his cheek a pat to see if it stings or not. And there while he's looking at me while covering that red mark I just made to his face, he gives me a cheeky smile. " Dude you're so in love with her man."

" Hah?" My mind suddenly went blank " Fuck no."

His hand gave me that pointy look " Hmm? Hm hm??" He repeatedly pokes my forearm as if he was expecting an answer from me. " Ask her out man." He says

Ask her out? Seriously I'm just like a regular guy with hated life and I'm gonna ask that girl who is more opposite than me? That's impossible.

" give me your phone?" He said immediately

" What?"

" Just give me your damn phone" he almost shouted.

Well, I don't any other choice but I gave my phone to him anyway. What's is he going to do with that anyway? Probably setting it on camera so that he can see that red mark on his face I just made.

He immediately taps something on my phone that his thumbs were pressing something with it that looks like he's typing something. " what are you doing?" He asked

And he completely ignored me. The longer he takes I feel unsure. He definitely did something to my phone that I don't like it. " Give me that!" I snatched away the phone from him and let me see what he did.

" just in time..." he says

" Hey... i just think that you're so beautiful that I might masturbate myself thinking about you. God your so beautiful I think I love you so much. Can we have a date?? xoxo"

And there the message was sent to Historia.

" What did you do!?" I shouted at him. I felt my hands were shaking from this fear and anger. " Floch seriously Jesus—" I almost tearing up from his actions

" I was trynna help, you man."

" help me!?" I responded back. " how can this help me, you twat! I might masturbate myself thinking about you!?" I read the text as I pressed my eyebrows together giving him a glare. " what the fuck? What is she gonna think of me now!?"

" well... let's wait until she responses..." he crosses his arms together. He looks really proud of himself.

And I'm going to kill him now.

To be continued....  
June 9, 2019


	8. Sunday dreamin'

" Welcome to our brand new show! Think it, Slam it! We'll ask the most brainstorming questions and you have to answer by pressing that red button! Are you guys ready!? In three, two, one and go—"

I'm just bored.

I've been sitting on the sofa watching this lame game show. I sat all day that my legs were stretched out to the floor in a slouch position. That's really a bad position for my back. I'm already hypnotized by this box screen in front of me. It feels like days looking at it not even realizing that you've been doing that for minutes. Time is slow today I suppose. I let out a lazy sigh as I repeatedly pressed the next button on the remote control over and over again, trying to find a good channel to watch.

Sunday. The last day of the weekend. Today was a pretty dark and cloudy one so that's the reason why I'm wearing my sweater and pajamas on. Thinking that school's going to start again tomorrow makes me wanna lay down on my bed and sleep until the Mondays up to Fridays were done. I'm basically a sloth. I think I am the worst than a sloth.

" you okey there?" Zeke hopped down beside me that made me make a little bounce against the sofa.

Zeke my big bro. He'll be staying here until graduation. He also has his finals on his whatever course he was. These upcoming months are going to be a lot busier than the previous ones.

"Hm..." I hummed as a response. I immediately grabbed my phone, open it and switch it to twitter trying to pretend that I'm doing something and he'll think that I'm not interested in listening to his words of wisdom.

"How's school?..." he moves closer as he scratched his ear with his index finger. " I mean... last week.."

It was pretty awkward talking to my brother who I never talked to for decades. We're actually pretty close when we were kids but when we parted ways, I never thought to meet him again. Were still good as acquaintances. Not as siblings but as aliens, probably.

"Uhm..." My mind suddenly went black. " good.." I lied, maybe in some parts.

"Give me that!" He immediately snatched my phone from me.

I give it to him anyway. I don't really care. He's probably opened every app I had on my phone. My phone's pretty empty, there's nothing interesting about it really.

The skies went darker as it makes little droplets of rain bit by bit. It went very misty and cozy as I saw the plants and trees were waving through the cold breeze. There I realized that the room gets colder. I can feel it to the floor since I'm barefooted. I embraced myself to get warmth to avoid this chilly feeling.

"Who's this?" After some minutes, Zeke finally says something.

He shows me my phone. It reveals to be a picture from a photo gallery. The photo was dark, it is probably located in a room where the lights were turned off. Historia was there who faces down on the white mattress that reveals her whitish back. Those clear blue crystal eyes were looking towards the camera with her blonde hair that shines through the moonlight from the glass window.

That's probably the time when she experienced the most heart-breaking moment of her life. The time when that guy lefts her behind. The night at the school party. I still couldn't believe that she told me that story. Usually, only close friends only know that kind of situation. She came up to me. Cried in front of me, saw her in a mess, saw her drunk, saw her crazy, saw her dancing around in a room that nobody's there except me... only me.

" it's nothing," I said in a monotone. " I'll get that now—" before I tried to get my phone back from him, he immediately backed me away by his arm and raises my phone up in the air teasingly. " dammit, Zeke!" I almost shouted. " Give me tha—"

Before I even say another word to him, he blocks my way even further and keeps my phone away from me. " Zeke!" I called him out.

" Is she your girlfriend?" He asks again. " you're dating her?"

That made me pause a little bit. I pressed my lips together, trying to control my heartbeat which is getting faster and faster every time she's on the topic. Why do I feel this way?

" n-no!" My voice suddenly feels broken. " she's not my girlfrien—"

Zeke starts to burst out laughing, sounding like a dying coyote " you..." he pointed his index finger at me. " You're blushing!" And starts to laugh even louder as he puts his hand on his belly.

"Goddammit" I cursed as I stood up from the seat and gets my phone from him immediately. I hopped back down with that annoying face on him. God, I hate him.

When I looked at my phone, the photo of her still displays on the screen. I don't really remember that I captured this moment. It got me confused a little bit that one of my brain cells was broken and kinda looks like unwired memory cells. That's what I call it.

When I swiped to the next photo, there's a photo of us laying on the bed with my chest facing the mattress as I put my head up to get a great angle. There's Historia behind me embracing me to my neck giving that sweet sleepy smile on the camera. Her nose was rosy red and her golden hair was literally a mess.

When was this? I can't really remember. Maybe I was too drunk back then. Did I drink too much? I'm pretty sure this happened after the school party when we escaped and went to her crib. Nothing really happened as I remember.

" do you like her?" Zeke asks with that perky eyes. " she's really cute in that photo with you..." he points out the photo. " you seem pretty close, huh..."

Are we? That made me think for a while.

" where did you guys first met?" Zeke asks again.

" Zeke..." I rolled my eyes as I faced him. " can you stop?" I said as I turned back and look at my phone again.

" what?" Zeke sends me that cheeky smile " I'm just asking you." He taps my shoulder with his shoulder. " yeah? Come on now. I'm just trying to know you more. It's been one day being here and I can't just you know." He pauses. " staying here without knowing what's been up to you now..."

I groaned as I scratched my head. Zeke has this habit of his that whenever he asks something he keeps on asking more questions. Now I remember how annoying he was when were still kids. And now, he's still a buzzing bee kind of guy that flies all around on your head. That's definitely worse than that now.

" Fine," I said in a sarcastic way. I face him. " I'm doing this is because you're getting annoying." I showed him my ironic smile.

"Okey then." He leans back to the sofa and crosses his arms on his chest. Does he really want to know about us? He's acting like a curious grandpa right now. " so... you do like her, huh"

" yes."

"Oh shit" he chuckles as he formed his fists on his mouth. " you went straightforward there" he starts to smile at me.

After I said that, it made me silent. Just... a little of moments of her is considered as a treasure in me. Every bit, every second with it, already means a lot to me. She's already the reason why I am always acting like this. Sometimes it's confusing, sometimes it's so dynamic that you can't really tell what it really means. It's just her. The one who made this for me. And now, I am flustered and giggly. Maybe, that's the reason why I'm acting so differently now.

" yeah..." I said it out of nowhere. I gazed at Zeke as I noticed his eyes were studying me. " what..?" 

Zeke looks so serious right now.

" Does she know?" Zeke's voice went softer. " that you like her?"

I shook my head. " no.." I said softly as I looked at my palms, clasping them together. " I don't even know if she likes me or not."

Those times we spend together are still in zigzags. It is yet unclear and blurry to say what I feel or what she feels about me. It is like it was scattered and put those pieces bit by bit by time.

" Just tell her." Zeke advises. " you'll never know what she feels if you let that feeling stay inside you." He pats my shoulders " yeah? It's time to man up!" He gestures by swinging his arm to his chest.

" I think she's going to hate me if I said that." I looked up to him. " I just argh.." I sighed as I put my head up looking at the ceiling. " I just think she's going to find out soon..." I said without looking at him that I can tell Zeke's been looking at my actions.

" you have to tell her." Zeke said as I looked back to him. " before it's too late." He raises his shoulders. " who knows..." he bites his fingernails " maybe tomorrow she's going to marry someone"

I chuckled " Nah..." I smiled at myself. " that's impossible."

" just maybe..." he stretched his arm to get his box of cigarettes sitting on our small table in front of us. He lit up as the smoke starts to linger in the air. He inhales through the cigarette stick and lets out the smoke in the air.

I think I'm going crazy. Just thinking about her makes me wanna smile just imagining her face on me. Just a little dream of her make me wanna stay and look at her forever. She makes my heart warm, she makes my smile grew bigger, she makes my nerves into nervousness.

I know this is cliche. But I like her. That's what I'm going to say. I'm in love with her. I know I've mentioned that several times now, it's just that... it feels wonderful when I thought about it.

My phone vibrates beside me. When I looked at it, someone was calling me and it was named Queen Bee.

My heart suddenly stopped when I read that name. She's literally calling me right now. I think I have a small heart attack. Shit, my chest suddenly feels hard. I grabbed my phone as pressed the green button that displays on the screen. I put my phone against my ear and all I could hear was her laughing.

That made my mouth into a crescent moon. A smiley one.

" Eren what's this?" She asks that her voice sounds like she's tired of laughing out loud. " what did you just text me?"

Now that she said that, I remember what Floch just did yesterday. I was in rage yesterday. Yep. I totally beat him up inside of that convenience store. Well, probably not too harsh but still, I smack his head hard.

" uhm yeah..." I chuckled " It's a long story..." I moved my body to the other side, facing away from Zeke to get a comfortable position. And probably also to have this private space between us.

" you did that?"

"Uhm.. yeah..." I have to admit, I was trying to feel her that I'm going insane about her. " I don't even remember I sent that message to you.."

" are you serious? I don't believe you..." she breaks it with a laugh. She said it. I think she knows how I type on my keyboard.

" oh yeah?" I said in defense mode. " are you free today?" Without even thinking, I said that to her.

" uhm yeah..?" She responses, I think she's confused right now.

" let's uhm.. go out."

" what?"

" I mean..." I cleared my throat. Suddenly, I felt butterflies inside of my stomach. It's weird. Every time the word was let out to hers, it makes me anxious. " you know... eat some street foods outside with you..."

" so technically, you're offering me a date?" She asks so confidently.

My heart suddenly stopped. A date? A freaking date!?

I didn't say anything. My mouth went shut.

" sure why not..." she said. " I'll meet you later..."

Our conversation ended right there.

I stood up from my seat as I felt my whole body was stoned as if it was cemented into blocks. I let myself breathe in heavily, not believing what just happened. I let my phone down not realizing that I dropped it right on the sofa. I turned around to face Zeke. He smirks at me while holding his burning cigarette. I never thought this would happen to me as the time runs so fast you don't even know what to do next. I've never had this much nervous before.

"Z-Zeke..." My voice went stuttered. " I need your help."

~~~~~~

It is already 7:00 in the evening and I'm becoming the early bird for the first time. I've been standing here for ten minutes, standing by the lamppost, leaning my back against it that the silence that I heard makes my heartbeat beating louder. She's not here yet probably most girls do that. That's what I know.

There are a few people walking around, mostly couples holding hands with smiles on their faces. Food stalls were still open on every corner. The savory and flavors spread throughout in mid air. The sounds of the pan, the stirring of a spatula, the laughing sounds, and the chattering making this whole place really lively even though it is a little misty and cloudy. I walked around as I stared at the night sky above. Stars were dancing, the moon was big, round, and white. I put my hands inside of my pockets as I sighed to control this nervousness of mine.

"Tonight is gonna be the night" Zeke once told me back in the apartment " you go there and tell her everything that you have to say "

Maybe this is the time that I have to change. But, goddammit. My chest feels hard again thinking that she's going to be here any minute now. There's nothing bad going to happen right? So I'll just say "hey" or maybe " It's a nice evening, yeah?" Fuck.

That made me walk around back and forth. This is going to be awkward. I've never experienced this before. I can't just end it like it was the worst day of my life. "Just be confident, Eren," I told myself. " just greet her say hi, and yeah..." Now I'm talking to myself.

From behind, I hear the soft whisper of footsteps. So I turn around to see who it was.  
She smiles at me with those pinkish lips and rosy cheeks. Her hair was laid down on her shoulders that have little curls on the bottom part. She's wearing a sweater that reaches down to her waist with her denim shorts and black boots. My heart was racing by looking at her. I'm shaking, an earthquake inside of me. C'mon Eren, you're not like this before right? Speak out. Say something.

"Uhm hey.." she says, still looking at me.

I looked at her for seconds now. Realizing that I might look like a creep for staring that long "You look pretty..." my mind went lazy.

She chuckles as her eyes lowered down, looking at herself " this is like..." she paused as she looks back at me. " what I always wear indoors..." after she said that, she turns the table. She looks closely at me from bottom to top. She smiles like she was about to laugh. " You look really formal there..." She said.

I was wearing a navy blue coat and white shirt underneath that pairs with my navy blue pants and my polished black shoes. Zeke really prepared this outfit for me.

" you do think this is too much?" That's what I asked

" no no it's fine. She's definitely going to love it" That's what he said. Damn you, Zeke.

"Uhh..." my throat went dry from not saying anything. " yeah...." my actions went very stiff that all I could do was to scratch my head and looking down on the ground. I can't look at her. She's just too flowery.

What I mean is that... she's so beautiful.

She laughs that beams up my mood like the thunderstorms suddenly turns into rainbows. She grabs my hand and pulls me over with her.

We held our hands together, our palms intertwined as I felt her small yet soft hands on mine. My face heats up that I don't how to process my brain anymore. She walks as she puts her head right beside me. " This is unexpected..." she says in a calm voice.

And there, we stayed in silence for a while. It was not that awkward silence but it is something that this silence makes a lot of meanings. The meaning with her, the meaning of connection, the meaning of how we felt on each other's side. It was worth it. Every single bit. Every particle it takes.

" for all the time we just had." She asks in a soft voice. " you just randomly invited me to go here for no reason." She smiles without looking at me. " that's weird..."

" I just want to... that's all." I asked in a low voice. " was that too weird?"

" no..." she says embracing my one arm. " it's nice actually." She breathes it with the breeze. "It's different." She says. " I usually take on a date at an expensive restaurant that you always wear those tight dresses. I hated it." After what she said, she looked up to me. " but this time, it's not that bad."

When I heard her response, it makes me more confident in her. She likes it. I think, I beamed myself up. I'm glad that she's glad too.

" do you like constellations?" She asks through the silence as we walked by the paths through the lamppost to another one. This place is quiet. But a positive type of quiet. She was right, this was nice.

" Uhm, we mean like stars that you connect the dots with?"

She looks up to me with a "seriously" smile. " are you that dumb?"

I raised my shoulders. " probably I am." I'm always dumb.

" to answer your question," she says " it is a yes and..." she looks up to the dark and deep skies. " I really like them. When I was a kid, I would always stare at the night sky. I was a boring kid. I'm not that sociable person you may know right now. Remember my big sis? She taught me all the constellations." She pauses for a while as she looks at the stars one by one. " you see that big one right there?" She points out.

So I looked and followed her finger. " yeah?"

" that's my star." She looks at me. " My big sis says that when you look at the stars, there's something one for you. It's like... you're lucky charm for the rest of your life." She tilts her head. " what's yours?" She asks.

"What's mine?" I take myself to look up and observe every star there is in the sky. They were scattered, tiny, some are bright, some are too little too bright that much light. That made me realize that the sky was bigger that our minds can't explore deeper through it. " Uhm, they kinda look the same to me..." I said. I'm not an observant kind of person.

" what about the one right beside mine?"

I can't deny that, am I? " uh.. sure.."

The sound of thunder enters the atmosphere. One, two, there's another one. The gray clouds above start to cover all the glitters in the sky. When the moon drives under the clouds, the park went darker as if the lamppost was the only source of light to be seen. Then, the howling of wind came as I felt one drop of rain on my shoulder. And it started raining.

I put off my coat and immediately put it on Historia's head. " We should go to that tree," I suggested as we walked towards it. "It's going to rain harder any minute now."

Without any word, we ran under there. Luckily it was probably just a few meters from us. The droplets went faster as it follows the thunder in the sky. Every step, we made paddles of water splashing each other. When we get there, I looked at her to see if she's okey. I removed the coat over her head as I sighed and I thought that... I didn't check the weather update earlier. This is the biggest mistake I made. Goddammit.

" you okey?" Somehow I panted. I probably have weak and stiff legs to walk fast that distance.

She snorts as she covered her mouth looking at me that I can barely see her eyes from smiling too big.

" what?" I raised my tone.

" it's nothing" she sways her hand away from her mouth as a gesture. " you're acting weird"

"Am I?" I said it out loud. Shit, I should probably say that in my head.

The wind blows making the trees and bushes sway through the wind as it follows the lightning and the roar of thunder. Historia closed her eyes as she embraced herself. Her golden hair waves through the wind as she takes a deep breath as she lets it out.

" I'm sorry..." I scratched my head. " this is probably the worst date of your life—"

"Shut up, Eren." She says that made my eyes jolted to look at her. She's already staring at me with those eyes. " People say that raining is the sign of loss, the sign of sadness, the sign of problems..." she says as she shook her head " and I don't believe that." She smiles. A beautiful smile. " I think it's beautiful..."

I felt my eyes were connected to hers. I always thought that her eyes were the most beautiful about her. I always thought that I might get lost on her for staring that long. In the beginning, I never thought this would happen to me. This... acting like this towards her is not normal. I was selfish. I don't care about others. I don't look up to someone. But when she came, it all started.

" you know... I noticed something about you..." she says

" what is it?" I asked that made me a little nerve-racking.

" you keep staring at me..." she says. " I wonder why. Is there something on me that's different?"

" w-what? N-no!" My voice is now broken. " of course not! I-it's just that..."

" that what?"

My brain shuts down. I don't know what to say. " I-uh.."

" you're the only one who did that to me." She says softly as she stared in front of her. Feeling the cold blowing of the wind. The sound of pitter and patters of rain and the singing of insects in the bushes. She smiles and says " never. No one in the world would do that to me." She gazed back at me. " only you. Why you?"

" You're Queen Bee..." I said. "Everyone looks up to you..."

She looks down to the ground. Avoiding my gaze to her. " Queen Bee isn't real Eren... Queen Bee isn't here. You don't like her don't you?" She pauses. " What you've been staring right now was just a regular person with no dreams or ambitions in life. I'm Historia Reiss. The one you look up to..."

The silence overwhelmed us. She's right... what I saw right now, the person that I am with was Historia Reiss. This girl was still a mystery to me. I always thought of that since the beginning. Who made Queen Bee? Who is Queen Bee? Who is Historia Reiss?

She smiles and says " and I'm just like you, Eren..."

The rain went softer. The thunder stops but the droplets continue into soft rain showers from the sky. The park is still dark but it definitely goes brighter than before as the moon above slowly shows up from the thick black clouds. Without realizing it, Historia starts to take off her sweater revealing her white sleeveless top.

" what are you doing?" My mind went confused.

" I'm just bored!" She shouted as she ran through the rain.

" hey wait!" I shouted back as I tried to grab her hand but it's too late. She's too fast.

From the distance, she twirls around as if she was dancing with the moon. The smile on her face as she looks up at the sky, closing her eyes, spreading her arms as she felt the rain showers cold as ice, but it somehow felt warm to her. The laughs, a chid-like laugh as she enjoys herself in the rain.

I let myself to join in with her. My nerves went surprised at how cold the droplets are. She grabs both of my hands as we twirl around. With her in front of me, the big smile on her face makes me smile even more. She put her both hands on my shoulders as I put mine on her waist. We take small steps. Backward and forward and sideways and twirls her around.

This silence was like music to me. And it was beautiful. We leaned our foreheads together as she closed her eyes, feeling my heartbeat.

" Historia..." I said softly.

" yeah?" She says without looking at me.

" I-I think I'm in love with you..." I finally said it.

I hold her hand as she holds mine. We locked our eyes together as our chest-beating. The rain above continuously flows down above us. Our soaked hair, soaked clothes, and our lake wet shoes. She blinks and smiles at me with those eyelashes with droplets of rain on it. It was cold, but the time we connect, all I could feel was the warmth from my chest.

" Prove it." She says.

My heart is getting louder that I could hear it to my eardrums. Prove it. Prove it Eren. I don't really know what to do. My hands were shaking as my legs felt jelly that I might fall in front of her of how much nervousness I felt right now. So I put my both hands on her cheeks. It was warm and soft.

"you're a different type of loser..."

"you're different than others. That's why I chose you..."

"Such an idiot..."

Those words still are in my mind. I'll always remember them. Now that Historia is here in front of me, I think those words were not from hers anymore. Today is the day. The start of everything. The new chapter, the new her, the day, and the new me.

I closed my eyes as I leaned in and kissed her on the lips. I felt her arms around my neck as she tip-toed herself to kissed me back. Soft and gentle. Her sweet lips, her soft lips, small lips, those lips...

I put my tongue in, sliding it down as I felt goosebumps along to my arms of how great this feeling is. I could taste her, sweet as vanilla, warm as the stars. My mind went cloudy as my hands went up to her chin, holding them as I kissed her even more. That smacking sound of lips, a kiss with eagerness, everything... everything felt wonderful.

She glides her head on the side, still holding my neck as I started to kiss the side of her lips, to her cheek connecting them and down to her neck. White, soft, and smooth I licked them by the tip of my tongue. Soft kisses over again as I found her spot and starts sucking it. It takes seconds that felt like hours.

" hey—" Historia cuts out and pushes me away from her. I looked at her. Soaking wet from top to bottom as I noticed a red spot that I made on her neck.

" Sorry..." I looked down, avoiding her eyes. I should've asked permission. I just did it as if my body wants me to.

Without any other words to say between us, Historia immediately goes near me letting her hand on my chest and one on my neck, pulls me down nearer to her that what happened next is her lips were now on my neck. I felt a shock type of pain, a different type of pain. She backs me away giving me that look. " it's not fair." She says. " so I give you one."

My whole body froze. My mind went blank. I breathe in and out slowly, not believing what just happened. This is an illusion? A dream? A vision of another universe? No... it's true. It's real life. She's standing there looking at me. And I'm standing there looking at her. I let my hand to my neck, feeling it still not believing she did that to me. I made a mark on her. She made a mark on mine.

She takes my hand as we ran over the pavement, splashing puddles of rainwater. " we're totally going to get sick tomorrow" She teasingly says.

Everything that happened today was surreal. Beautiful. And wonderful.

To be continued...

The rain stops and we totally look like street cats who accidentally jumps off to the river.

" you know what's funny?" She says with her mouth full eating a hamburger as we sat on the bench on the side.

" what?" I said, looking at her.

" People might think we're crazy" she snorts " they're probably going to be like what the fuck is these two doing in the rain? Such immature!" She mimics.

" Pfft.." I try to hold my laugh. " and now we're soaking. My clothes feel heavy now."

She chuckles. " yeah..." she puts her head on my shoulder, looking at the distance as the moon above starts to show again.

" thank you, Eren..."

September 15, 2019


	9. you don't know her name

Some of you might think that today is going to be just like yesterdays. School days began, again and again over and over again. Same hallway, same faces, same rooms, and everything. Everything is just the same.

When I stepped in, everything went different. Today's melancholic. It looks like in a black and white horror movie in the early 90s. It seems like you're in stop motion that everything you see was terrifying.

Their eyes were locked on me as if I feel the tension within them. Their eyes made my hands sweaty that tightens my grip on the arm sling of my backpack. I want to know what happened. I know it's just the start of the day but it feels like I'm missing something. Something that I was involved in it. And I don't know what it is.

Today was mysterious.

Gossips. It always lingers in the air. It's endless. I keep thinking that they were talking about me. To be honest, it was pretty obvious. I know they're talking about me. Their movements, their eyes tell it. I think I made something really bad and my heart starts to bounce really hard.

The footsteps of heels clanking against the floor. I saw her, she was there walking towards me. It's different. That's the other her. She stays her eyes on me, glaring at me. Her eyes were different as if it wasn't really her when I first met her.

It feels like she's somebody else like a stranger.

Her face was a mess but she still has her whitish skin and her blood-red lips. On the other side, her eyes were red as if she was crying a lot that her makeup on her eyes spreads down to her cheeks.

The School Goth has become a lost weeping child.

I stopped. My body went frozen. I keep looking at her, trying to figure out what's happening.

She dashed her hand to me on the left side of my cheek. It stumbled me backward. My body went still, frozen, shocked. My face went hot on that spot and eventually stings slowly and now was burning into flames. I breathe in as I looked at her.

" huh?" My mind went dizzy, trying to recall what I did wrong to her. " Mikasa I—"

" I hate you!" Before I said something else she cut me off. " I hate you so much!" Those words from her mouth stab me. " I hate you!" She said louder this time as I saw her tears continuously flows down to her cheeks. " I hate you—"

" wait let's talk—" I tried to grab her arm but I failed. She sways her arm away from me.

" Go away! Stay away from me!" Her voice cracks through her sobbing.

I was trying to say something. Something that will make her less upset. I'm empty-headed, my head fills with air. There's this always a part in a play that you don't really understand what it was trying to say. I think I'm in it now. I'm lost. I'm missing. I don't know. I don't know what to do.

What did I do?

Mikasa was shaking. Her eyes were still on me with that face that haunted me. She hates me. She definitely hates me now. My mouth was shut and I could think of what was in me. It was all about me. I knew it. I am totally a shitload of garbage.

" Never go near me again," She says, yet in a bold voice. She never hesitates. She never said anything else after that. She turns and starts to walk away from me.

"If I were him, I'm going to hide from this place."

"Poor him. He looks very lost and it's killing me!"

" are you kidding me? He doesn't know? Oh my god."

My vision went dark. The world was spinning. I hear all the voices in my head and it's getting louder and louder. My heart beats up fast. Faster, as my hands started to shake. I am scared. I'm scared to look at all of these people. My legs went weak and I couldn't move. I was stoned.

" I bet he needs his mommy now. How sad"

" are you going to cry?"

"Baby's going to cry."

" no one's going to help you."

I wanted to shout. I want to scream in front of them. To stop. To stop looking at me. Stop talking about me. Stop. Just stop! I can't. I can't look at them. I want to get out of here. I want to escape from this reality.

The school bell suddenly rings.

My vision went back to normal. My chests feel heavy as if I was carrying black steel inside of my lungs. I was sweating. I just realized and it was the worst feeling I ever felt.

I still can't look at them. It feels like you're scared of something but you don't know exactly what it is. The eyes surrounded me. They've been watching at every movement I take.

I lifted my hand, slowly opening it as I noticed red marks on my palm from the tip of my nails. I didn't realize that I closed them way too hard. I'm scared of people and they might destroy me while I'm still alive.

" Eren Jaeger and Jean Kirschtein please proceed to the principal's office. Again, Eren Jaeger and Jean Kirschtein please proceed to the principal's office thank you..."

My name was mentioned through the hallway. It's like it was traveling through a canyon. It echoes over and over until everybody's ears heard it. It always all about me. I'm starting to hate it.

Why is it me all the time? I keep asking that all the time.

~~~~~

The floor was made out of wood. I hear my own footsteps. It's getting louder and louder when I step in further into the room. I'm getting nervous seeing the other facilities looking at me with the wonders in their eyes. I did something wrong, I can definitely feel it right now. I mean that's the reason why I'm here, am I right?

When I turned the doorknob, I already saw Jean's head so steady he couldn't move. He was sitting there with both hands on the armrest as his fingers tapping on them nonstop. I knew it. He was nervous too.

" Good morning, sir..." I looked at the principal as I saw Jean's head turns to look back at me.

" Have a seat, Mr. Jaeger."

And I followed. I sat right next to Jean who is I can tell, is tensed up.

" you two may be wondering why you guys are here, am I right?"

We stayed silent. As I looked at my palm on my lap. To be honest, I just want to get out of here.

I saw the principal sliding some photos on his table. I didn't really saw it totally. I was leaned further back to my chair.

" Do you remember what you two were doing back in the school party last Friday?"

"No," Jean answered immediately. " We're just having fun. That's it."

" No time to lie Mr. Kirschtein." He pauses through his croaky voice. " I have pictures that serves as proof. "

I leaned in towards his table. Seeing the picture of us. Me and Jean on the couch drinking Jean's bottle of sprite he offered me back there. Not gonna lie, seeing our laughs in that picture, how we look like chaos at the party was one of the best moments of my life. But it doesn't mean it'll turn alright at all. That's right, we drank alcohol at the party.

" who even took those pictures?" I asked

" You have no right to know, Mr. Jaeger," He says.

Dammit. It has to be someone. Someone who hates me. Someone who I encountered before. Who could it be?

" Someone reported to me that you two drank alcohol at the party. You know Alcohol is strictly prohibited in this University. It was written in the student handbook. And this will serve as an offense."

" goddammit." I heard Jean hissed beside me as he put his back leaned to the chair with force. He's pissed.

And of course. Another offense I made. Again. With that, I remember how my dad was so upset when I get offenses. He expects so much from me. To be better. To be smart. To be dependent. When I think about those things, I think I can't do that. Because it's not me. At myself anymore. And I know he's going to be so pissed when he found out about this.

" Based on the records..." The principal looks at me.

This is going to be all about me, isn't it?

" This is now your second offense." He says as he crosses his fingers together. " This is already a warning, Mr. Jaeger."

" what? I have to clean the football field again?" I snapped.

" Not this time. Since Jean is also here, you two will work together. This will serve as your punishment. You two will be attending detention class."

What I know about detention class was torture. Today is going to be the worst day of my life.

~~~~~

It doesn't make sense at all. I still don't know what made Mikasa upset about me. I kept thinking about all of my previous events with her and I don't think I remember one.

" This sucks," Jean said beside me.

We were about to go to our detention class. There's literally a counselor guarding us behind. And that's right, there's no escape at all.

I don't exactly know what they're going to us and I have to prepare myself. Because I think this might destroy my brain. I'm going to be a fish who's stuck inside of a fishbowl.

" that picture of yours though," he says and that made me caught my interest. " it's been spreading through the whole school. Everyone's made fun of it." He says in a normal voice.

" wait what?" I don't know what he is talking about. " a picture of me?" I asked him.

He looks at me with that serious look. " you don't know what I'm talking about?"

I pressed my eyebrows together as a slowly shook my head as a no.

" so you walked inside of this school without knowing anything at all?"

" not at all," I said softly

" are you kidding me?" He straightaway put out his phone from his jacket. Unlocks it and the next thing he did was he showed me the photo of Mikasa kissing me at the school party.

" Everyone's calling Mikasa a slut now," he says softly. I know he's hurt. I know that from the very beginning, he has feelings for her, and I know he doesn't want this to happen. But I keep wondering, why is he so chill with this situation going on right now?

"What the hell?" My mind didn't come up immediately.

" so it was true then." He says with a glare. "I swear to god. I've been hoping that this picture has to be fake." He pauses as he pressed his eyebrows together" You kissed her" His voice broke. He stops and corners me by the wall. His face was so close that I can't breathe. " You better watch yourself" he means it.

From the look of his eyes, it was the eyes of the tiger ready to eat me alive. And I was right, they're always will be the predator while I'm going to be a soulless prey. His hand was so tensed that it slowly appears in his veins through his arms. He's going to punch me right away I can feel it.

" I didn't kiss her." I said, hardly giving away my breath to his face close to mine " she's the one who kissed me first"

" and you didn't back away!" He barked

" that's enough!" The counselor finally said something right before Jean going to punch me. " You have to behave yourselves," she says, targeting her eyes at us one by one. " you're already in high school. Be mature enough" Her gaze was long enough to study Jean, who's hands were still clenched. He didn't want this to happen to him. It all went messed up. "Especially you, Jean," She says " I'm watching you..."

And it all went silent.

~~~~~

Space. I always wondered how big the galaxy is. Some said that it was endless that you could fit a giant inside of it. I think it was impossible. Nobody doesn't know how big space is. Our human mind will always have a limit. We don't really know what's beyond there. I always wondered. Will be there other humans out there?

" that's why I like stars," she says while looking above the sky. " it's so big that you can swim through it" she sighs as she looked at me then smiles. That smile... " thank you, Eren..." She says in a smooth voice. Feels like a flowing river from the breezing falls.

I put my hand over hers. Holding them tightly as I felt her small and soft hands. I looked at her lips. Pinkish that her lip balm shines through the lamppost right behind us. The park was quiet and I think we were the only ones here in this park at this time.

She slowly puts her hand on the side of my cheek. Resting them for a moment as her eyes were studying mine. I inched closer to her as she leaned closer as well. Closing our eyes until our lips touched once again—

A crumpled paper just hit me on my face that pulls me awake. I snapped my eyes open. It was blurry as I found myself staring at the ceiling for too long. I groaned as I felt a jolt of pain at the back of my neck. "Argh fuck" I hissed and the pain felt like my neck is going to snap soon.

" nice posture you have there."

I looked to my right, the one who is talking to me. Her face is unfamiliar. She had her bangs that covers her right eye, wearing a messy bun on the back. She's been staring at me with her chin on her palm. I guess she's a punk since that she's wearing a black leather coat and redshirt under it. Also, a black mini shirt, black knee socks, and those punk-looking shoes.

Looks like a stranger to me.

" w-who are you?"

" People call me Annie." She says immediately. " and I guess you don't know anything about me at all." She smirks " right Eren?"

She knows my name...

" I'm ' the bad girl'." She says as she gestures her hand into quotation marks. " that's what people here call it. Kinda the same as Jean. Just like." She pouted her lips as she raises her shoulders " Girl instead of a boy of course."

" so like... you're..?" I wasn't sure what to say.

" yup. A high caste. I'm like a mystery owl coz.." she moves her feet facing towards me as if she was about to tell a very long story. " I don't really go outside that much.." she squints her eyes " coz I like being here in detention class... so some people might not know me at all. Unlike your Queen Bee am I right?"

" h-how did you know-"

A shush interrupted us from behind.

The Wannabe. She was sitting right behind me, with her arms crossed to her chest. I saw her eyes in pinkish-red and her eye bags appear below her eyes. She doesn't wear make-up today which is rare to see her like that.

" and now look who's interrupting us..." Annie teased her.

" Annie, can't you see?" She says in a harsh yet broken tone. " we're in the middle of our detention shit" she seems pretty off today.

" Hitch?" My voice raised surprisingly how Hitch went to this situation. " w-what are you doing her—"

Before I can even finish my sentence, Annie interrupted me. " she's been crying in the hallway and starts to vape all of the sudden. Someone reported and there she's here 30 minutes ago while you're asleep..." she sighs after saying that long sentence "And of course..." she titled her head facing towards me with that I'm so done look. " this school has so many rules and it sucks."

" Marlowe broke up with me, okey!?" Her voice squeaks through her tiring voice. " it's stupid.."

That's right. The detention class. It feels like forever. I don't even know how many hours I have been sitting and staring at the ceiling. We were just there, staring at nothing while there's a television playing certain lessons that I don't even understand. It was probably made centuries and it makes my head so dizzy whenever I look at it.

The walls were made out of planks of wood. It was a small room. Clearly, there's just the four of us. This girl named Annie, Hitch, Jean at the back, and me. We're the detention buddies I guess.

Annie leans towards me and starts to whisper " I hope that bad boy over there is fine..."

She's referring to Jean who is sitting at the very back corner like he just wants to get away from this room. To be honest, I think he's dead. Metaphorically.

" wait hold up..." Annie backs away as her eyes spot something on my neck. " is that a hickey?" Her voice went high.

My head snapped. My heart just skipped a beat, feeling so embarrassed right now. I just got a memory with Historia yesterday. Thinking about this red mark reminds me of what was really like to be with her. I feel my face starts to heat up. I forgot to get a bandage to cover it up. Dammit.

" I-uh.." My voice broke.

" Oh my god..." she smiles as if she was about to chuckle " don't tell me Queen Bee did that to you..."

I was trying to defend myself. But all that my mind left was nothing but air. I couldn't think of anything to say at all. " it's—"

" what?" She interrupted me again. " You're going to lie?" She shakes her head and lets out her soft laugh but it could mean anything. " I know she did it.." she says " she always did that..."

Did what...?

"Annie..." Hitch whine behind me. " c'mon he's just a newbie. He doesn't know things.." she stands with her feet and went right beside Annie. She crosses her arms and her left leg forward-looking towards me. " so she's definitely doing it, huh.."

I blinked several times. Many too many. I pressed my eyebrows together, looking at them one by one. I shake my head as I tried to roam my eyes around looking for answers. It all feels like a puzzle. A puzzle that has no solutions at all. " what are you guys talking about?" I said, " What do you mean she's doing it?" I put my hands on my head and there's no answer to come up with it. " she's doing what?"

Annie looked at me with a little concern in her eyes. She sighs heavily as she scratched the back of her neck. " Look Eren..." she says carefully. " Queen Bee is a stranger to you." She gestured her hands on me. " and we're talking about was what she did in the past. And I tell you this time. Try to stay away from her as possible.."

I wanted to scream. " she did what? Just answer me!"

" really really bad..."

" her very worst..."

Hitch and Annie said it at the same time. " Queen Bee is my best friend since day one." Hitch said as she found her seat beside Annie. " and I know all of her secrets..." she says in a whisper. " and I still couldn't believe she did that on purpose."

" you're just her servant, right?" Annie puts her arm over the back of her chair. " it means really nothing to her. And you're just nothing like dust to her."

" you don't really know her name, don't you Eren?"

~~~~~

The classes were finally ended for this day. I stood there, staring at the exit as more people start to appear from their classes. It looks like what it looks like earlier. More people, more faces, more gossips. It went all the same.

But now one thing is different. Mikasa was outside. She looks tired of people. Those were dark and empty. She wanted to talk to me but she can't be near where else around me anymore. With that picture of us, I think people are going to judge us endless.

Historia holds my hands as I looked down at her. " are you okey?" She asks, concerned. She lowered her eyes. " I've heard that there's this picture of you and uhm..." she was afraid to mention it. " that keeps spreading around."

" yeah..." That what all my mind left. " it sucks.."

" I know..."

" You're just her servant, am I right? You're just nothing like dust to her..." That voice keeps repeating in my head and I don't know who's right and wrong. Am I supposed to believe them?

Queen Bee was a rivalry to everyone? The one who's the villain? The monster? The mean girl?

Now that we've met several times now, I can't imagine her being like that. People have such stories about her. Stories that destroys herself, that destroys other people. And I'm just here, desperately to know what was this all about her. I'm just a little bird flying, as I'm trying to get some answers.

" Can I uhm.." Historia's voice went softer. " can I stay with you tonight? Dad and I kinda have a fight earlier..." she sighs " and I don't want to see him after this all crap happening in our school."

" yeah sure..." I agreed right away. " and maybe... we have to talk about something.."

" something about what?" She wonders.

"I can't even imagine why Queen Bee did that." Annie says focusing on me. " it's okey if you don't believe me or us but we're just here telling the truth. You're just acting like a puppet. She controls you." She lets out a heavy sigh. " Queen Bee is a monster..."

" and you don't know anything about her at all..."

To be continued....  
October 28, 2019

Vid: forever by labrinth


	10. Who are you?

" you're a bit tense back there," Historia says.

We walked together heading towards my apartment. Our shoulders almost brush together to our sides. I kept thinking myself to hold her hand once more but it feels like she's way too far to hold her. To touch her. I want to reach her, I just can't.

I just don't remember how.

Now that we're outside, it feels like you're finally out of a horrible hurricane. Having that great relief, I can now finally breathe some fresh air.

Back at school was complete torture. Complete darkness. Too many people to look at. Too many rumors to listen to. So many words to believe in something. This will never end. Never and ever.

" Uhm yeah probably..." Remembering what just happened in school makes me want to disappear. It makes me wanna delete all of those things and pretend that it really didn't happen.

But the more I think about it, the more I knew it was real.

It can't help it and it all happened. There's nothing really to do right now. Unless you travel back in time.

And I wished that every day. What if. What if I did something different back then?

I went to my doorstep as I find my keys inside of my pocket. Historia waits behind. She was silent. Patiently waiting for me to open the door.

I knew she was going to say something but I think she refused to say it out loud. It was silent and I think that was the loudest sound I heard. That silence can mean anything.

Once I open the door, we both went inside. The room was dark and it's obvious no one is here yet. Zeke has not come home yet. He's probably doing some practical exams.

I went for the switch as the light beams through the living area. And for the other one in the kitchen. " do you want some coffee?" I asked getting two cups from the cabinet and a pack of coffee.

" Sure, thank you..." she says as she followed me to the kitchen table. " everything changed." She noticed.

" yeah?"

"Mm-hm" she hummed as she takes herself to look around the living room. " when I first got here..." her voice went softer because of the distance between us. " there's a lot of cup noodles everywhere. It's gone. So I guess you don't eat noodles anymore, huh"

I get the kettle from the lower cabinet as I pour water into it. Put it on the stove, turns on the fire then it starts heating up. " I got someone to cook."

It was Zeke.

" which is nice," I said.

" I supposed it was your girlfriend, then?"

" N-no," I said immediately that I almost drop the spoonful of powered coffee on the table. " I-I don't have a girlfriend.." I murmured. My chest suddenly feels hard.

Thinking about girlfriend made me think about her a lo— I mean no one.

" my brother is here so he's taking charge of everything."

Calling Zeke my brother still grosses me a lot. That old man even looks older than my own dad. Basically being with him feels like I'm with Grisha. It annoys me and I hated it.

" you have a brother?" She asked.

Once the kettle is done, I poured it slowly into each cup. " uh yeah..." I said.

It didn't really bother her for anything. She's just there walking around the living room as if it was her first time in here again. To be honest, when Zeke came, everything changed. And yes of course that includes that I don't eat cup noodles anymore. That's a success I guess.

Historia stops by the divider where there are picture frames of Zeke and I when we were kids. I didn't suggest that. Zeke was the one who did that. He said it'll be like the old times and I don't really believe in that. I'm still surprised. He kept those pictures from Germany all the way here.

She picks up one, looking at it closely as she touched by the tip of her fingernails on the glass frame. She smiles. A weak smile. There is something about her smile. It was a mix of happiness and sadness.

" Historia?" I called her out as she looked back at me.

" oh Uhm.." she put back down the picture frame. " I j-just—you two look cute" she clasps her hands as she walked by the dining table where her coffee was ready. " I just remembered my sister that's all... and the thank you for the coffee by the way..." she sits down right across me.

" Is everything alright?" I asked her, hopefully not a bad question.

She looks up to me, frowns her eyebrows together. " what?"

I think that was a bad question.

" of course, Eren..." she stirs the coffee. " why did you ask that?"

To be honest, I was just wondering about her. I know she wanted to say something but she was silent. She all keeps it to herself. I don't really know her. I don't understand her. I don't see her. I just couldn't understand why

she was Queen Bee.

I cleared my throat. " Today seems pretty bad.. so..."

" People are miserable nowadays." She took a sip.

There's a part of me that I wanted to confirm if Annie saying back there was true. There's a part of me I don't believe them. There's another part of me that I should believe them. I am neither of them.

What did she do back then? Why are they telling me to stay away from her? Does she know? Does she know what people think about her? Talking shit when she's turning back? Was she ignoring them? Does she even really care what others say about her?

" Eren..?"

My head snapped.

" Is there something you wanted to say about me?" She asks.

My mouth suddenly feels dry. I was sweating internally. I panicked. I don't really know what to say next. " Uhm nothing..." I looked down at my lap.

I am drowning.

" I know you do.." she leans back to her chair. " what is it?"

I wanted to ask all of those questions to her. But for some reason, I couldn't let them all out. I still wasn't sure about it. I wasn't sure if I'm seeing right now is Historia.

What did you do back then?

" Who's Queen Bee..?" That's what my mouth comes up with.

There is the silence after that. She didn't move. She didn't flinch. She stayed there as if she couldn't hear the question. Then she smiles. I don't know if it was my question if it was funny or stupid. Her smile was small and weak as her eyes were glued on me. Her eyes sparkle from the light bulb at the ceiling. I can't really tell if her eyes were the ones sparkling or her actual tears.

She didn't say a word.

She stayed there. Speechless.

" Eren? You home?"

Historia turned her head, following the sound. Clearly avoiding my question. There is definitely something about her right now.

" Zeke?" I stood up from my seat and went to the front door. The windy mist came in when I opened the door. It was a cold night outside. And Zeke, standing there with a scarf wrapped around his neck.

" someone's there inside?" Zeke says.

" wait what? How did you know someone is here?"

Zeke steps in, taking off his shoes as well as his scarf. " well, it's pretty obvious." He looks at me smirking then points his eyes to a pair of shoes outside which belongs to Historia.

I rolled my eyes as I groaned. " of course..." I closed the door. " don't do anything stupid" I whispered.

" of course of course..." He puts all of his things on the couch. " I'm your big brother." He faces me and raises his eyebrows. " it'll be fine.."

I really got the feeling that it'll be a disaster.

Zeke's a troublemaker since day one. I don't think he said those things seriously. He walks in further to the dining table as he saw Historia sitting there, waiting for us.

" Zeke!" I called him out.

" Well... hello there miss," Zeke says, in a very unusual tone. He's literally trying to be formal. I cringed as I found Historia eye-ing on me.

" Uhm..." Histora couldn't say anything. " you must be uhm—"

" Zeke." He says " Call me Zeke." He lets out his hand, offering a handshake. " Eren's brother" Historia smiles as she accepted his offer.

" nice to meet you..." she says, in a cheerful tone. " I'm Queen Bee"

With that voice of hers, she was trying to step away from the conversation we just had earlier. She's much more joyful now as if earlier didn't really happen. I knew. I always knew that there's always a thing hiding inside of her. What was she trying to hide it from? Why can't she just tell me what's going on?

Your name was Historia, wasn't it?

" Woah. Queen Bee? Your name?"

Historia nods as she smiles.

" That's a very unique name." Zeke admires " if I remember it clearly... you must be the girl from my little brother's phone—"

I cleared my throat " alright alright..." I pushed Zeke's shoulders away from Historia.

" Trust me. He complains a lot. " Zeke says " you see, Eren is a stubborn kid—argh"

I elbowed him to his chest that yanked him backward. I glared at him, pressing my eyebrows together. I wish I could put my middle finger at him. But not now. Not with a visitor.

" If I remember clearly." I cleared my throat, sarcastically. " we got homework to do, right Hist— I mean Queen Bee?"

Historia pressed her eyebrows together. Confused. But then, she just played it along. " uh—yeah" her voice stuttered, trying to act normal. " in literature..."

" so..." I smiled at Zeke and I cringed inside of me. " We'll do it in my bedroom..." I said as I glanced back to Historia telling her to go to my bedroom with my eye language.

" oh come on" Zeke groans. " I have so many things to say to you, Queen Bee"

" It was nice having a little convo with you, uhm—Zeke" Historia stood up from her seat. " but we had this project of ours."

" yes yes of course" Zeke scratched the back of his neck. " school first before anything else, right?"

" uh yeah," she says as she glanced at me. I smiled as I pointed my eyes to my bedroom telling her to go there. " I—uh—go to the—um"

" ah yes yes of course" Zeke steps aside as she walks her way up to my bedroom.

It went very quickly but when I was about to follow her behind, Zeke grab my shoulder "dude" he says " I didn't know your girlfriend would be that gorgeous. Damn you lucky"

" wait what?" I said it immediately, shoving off his hand off from my shoulder " I told you already. She's not my girlfriend!" I half-shouted, maybe a little bit too loud for Historia to hear upstairs. " she's just my partner for this uhm—homework, okey?"

We have to lie sometimes, right?

" I thought she said the project—"

" look, Zeke. We don't have enough time. So I need to go now, alright?" I don't even wait for Zeke to respond.

" But wai—"

I ran upstairs as reached my bedroom.

" Later, Zeke!"

He totally doesn't have a clue of what's going on right now.

~~~~~~

When I was now in front of my bedroom, my anxiety strikes me again. It is going to be me and Historia alone in that room. I don't know how to even act when I face her again. I mean, when school ended earlier, I wanted to talk to her. I wanted to know the truth.

The truth about Queen Bee.

But before I turn the doorknob, I hear small and weak snobs of tears. I hear someone crying. Crying alone in that room.

I opened the door very slowly as I saw from the corner of my eye, Historia sitting on my bed crying while looking out on the window in front of her. I saw her tears glistening against the moonlight outside, slowly sliding down to her cheeks.

When she heard the door creaks, she quickly wipes off her tears.

I stepped in, without saying any other word as I carefully sat down beside her. I don't know if talking was the right solution. I just sat there quietly with my hands on my lap, sitting still that our breathing sounds get louder in this quiet room.

" you listened, didn't you?" Historia says through her croaky voice, without looking at me.

" I don't know..." I responded in a soft voice.

" you believe that I was the enemy, didn't you?" She asks again.

" I don't know..."

To be honest, I don't really know anymore.

" of course you do" she looked at me, half smiling. " Annie told you, right?"

She knows.

" I-I wanted to know the truth," I said

" why? I'm the enemy, right? Why do you want to know everything?"

" Because I want to hear it from you," I said " there's a part of me still believing that what they said back there wasn't true. What I'm seeing right now? Look at you. You're Historia, not Queen Bee"

There was a long silence.

She looks at me. Studying me as her tears slowly appearing in her eyes, glittering like stars. " dammit Eren." She swears. " you hated me back then, didn't you? Why can't you just hate me like before..." Her tears start to flow down to her cheeks.

My chest feels like a rock. So hard that you can't breathe. " I-I can't," I said, stuttering. " I like the way you are right now. The person right in front of me."

She sniffs. She hiccups " n-no Eren. You don't get it..." she shakes her head, looking down. " Please. Not like this..."

I grab her shoulders as I hug her tightly as she rested her head on my chest. She let her tears flow down to my chest. Letting out soft cries. I felt her heart beating fast as her hands starting shaking.

" shh, it's okey it's okey..." I rub her back.  
I kissed her forehead as I put my both palm to her cheeks, slowly sliding to the side by my fingertips removing some of her strands of hair on her face. Her eyes turned red, her nose went rosy, her lips went pinkish.

I leaned in as I softly kissed her forehead, down to her each eye, to her cheeks, and a quick kiss on her lips.

The night went longer. I embraced her until her cries were gone. Until the time it went peaceful quiet that our breathing was the only music in this dark.

Historia fell asleep in my arms. She must've been tired with those dreadful tears.

" Historia was a sad girl. She always feels that she was in this place that she's in complete darkness and everything around her was a stranger." says " Queen Bee is much better but she's mean at some times. But everybody loves Queen Bee. Everybody hated Historia because Historia is a sad girl."

"Thinking about it, I probably had the worst life in this world. I-I don't want to be like Queen Bee anymore, Eren..."

" Then don't be like Queen Bee," I said whispering to her ear.

" I can't. I'm trapped in this box..."

" You can Historia..." I rubbed her back. " I know you can..."

She sniffs as I felt her smile through my chest. " I knew it." She sighs. " you really are a different type of loser..."

To be continued....  
December 6,2019  
Vid: Sometimes by Benjamin Francis Leftwich


	11. I am Historia Reiss

" I'm in trouble right now," She says, hugging her knees together.

Then the sky went dark. It started raining. It went dark. It went cloudy and misty. The feather flocks of clouds were gloomy as it covers the blue ocean sky. The pitter-patters of rain felt like rocks falling from above. It was so loud against the roof of the vehicle that I almost couldn't hear my own voice.

" you're not going to believe it." She continues as she looks at me.

"I'm not going to believe what?"

" That they kicked me out of the school." She says

" what?" My chest jumped. " w-what h-how? I mean Historia why did they—"

" they're just sick of me, that's all..." she raises her shoulders.

And I'm nervous and anxious about her " what happened?"

She sighs. A heavy sigh. " It happened so fast." She pauses, looking outside. " I confessed to the principal." She looks at me closely. " if I tell you this I think you'll gonna hate me forever..." as she said it further, her voice gets softer and softer.

Five hours earlier...

Today. It was surprisingly started very well. It's not like the same atmosphere as yesterday. Today was bright, the sun is out, the sky is so blue that only a few clouds flying are only to be seen.

What I mean today it started very well is that...

Annie, Hitch, Jean, and I escaped from that detention class. Well, we all planned all about it. We can't just stay there in that torturous room for three days. We'll definitely be going to rot to hell and I'm sick of that room.

Nobody cares about us. We're just troubled teenagers doing dumb things.

"Thank god!" Annie says in relief panting from running then laughs. I never heard her laugh before. " nobody catches us!"

"Whooo!!" Hitch runs through the football field, putting her arms in the air, twirling around as the wind blows her hair. She doesn't care about it anymore.

" Quit shouting, asshole!" Jean points out Hitch. " people are going to spot us, dammit!"

" The fuck is your problem, huh?" Hitch shouted back. " We're like the only four of us here. Everyone's in class, dumbass!" She shouted with that sassy tone. She glanced towards Annie. " right, Annie?" She breathes. " it's been a while since you're outside of that detention shit, right?"

We all glanced back at her.

Her voice cracks. " uh-yeah. And?"

" are you kidding me?" Jean barks out. " you prefer to be hidden in that fucking room? The fuck's wrong with you—"

" that doesn't matter right now." Hitch says marching towards her, grabbing her wrist and pulling her to the football field. " come on!"

" w-what are you doing?" Annie felt unsure about it.

The field was suddenly filled with laughter. The two of them twirl around the field. Holding each other's hand like children would do. They fall over the ground as their smile shines with bright sunlight above us. And this suddenly felt free. I mean no one's around right now. No one's watching. No one's listening. No one's going to stop us from this point. You can do literally anything you want.

" I swear to god..." Jean hissed as she pinched the bridge of his nose. " if someone's going to spot us, I'm going to bang their heads together."

Well, except for that guy.

Jean's eyes move looking at me. " what asshole"

I gave him a stare. " someone's pissed." I said. " let me guess. It was because of me, isn't it?"

" obviously" he rolled his eyes away from me. " do you think what you did yesterday was like nothing? Of course not."

I never talked to Mikasa ever since that day happened. We slowly are getting apart. I haven't seen her today and I still struggle to look at her. Because I knew she's still pissed at me. I think we'll never talk again after that. I just wish she'll be alright.

" hmm yeah." I don't care anymore. " if you're pissed alright then..." I put my hands inside of my pocket. " there's nothing I can do is there?" I looked at him. " it happened" I raised my shoulders. " it happened. That can't change now."

" I hate you so much." His words felt like magma. Spitting out from the mouth of the volcano. He means it. I've heard those words several times since I've been here in this school. That didn't affect me anymore.

" haven't I told you already before?" He says. " to stay away from Queen Bee? You didn't listen." He barks out. Every time I heard her name, I can recall what happened last night. That's the very first time to see her cry like that. It was something. Something that she wanted helps from me. She can't speak it out. There's still one more thing that is still hidden in her.

" I don't want to be Queen Bee anymore, Eren..."

" I knew she was included in this." Jean says, stepping closer to me as if he wanted to glue all of his words inside of my head. " She always causes all the trouble. She's the reason why all of this happened. Why there are castes. Why there are ranks. High, or low. Fuck." He runs his fingers through his hair. " this..." he pointed his finger on the ground. " this is why this school sucks." He hesitates. " she did all of this, Eren"

" she didn't do anything," I said straightforward.

" Just for once!" He grabbed my shoulders with force. " just listen to us!" He shouted that I could see the veins on his neck.

" Jean..." Annie just said, walking towards us then looks at me. Her eyes were sad and sorrowful as if she had pity on me. Had pity on something. Someone. " there's nothing you can change his mind right now." She says.

" he's her servant, right?" She talks at Jean, putting her hand on his shoulder. " of course he's not going to believe us." At this point, I think Annie just accepted it. The fact that I'm with Historia. With her.

Hitch shakes her head as she crosses her arms to her chest. " he's brainwashed..." she says then darts her eyes on me. " you're brainwashed." She clicks her tongue.

So many rocks of words were thrown at me. Some a soft. Some are hard. Some are sharp and deadly. I think I already knew how Historia handle this kind of pain. Every day at school, she hears those words. At the end of the day, she'll act and pretend that everything was fine. That smile she always showing, those laughs, her craziness, her sassiness. She kept those dark times hidden. She acted. She pretended. She kept it.

And that night, that was her first time to release that pain at me. Right in front of me. I understand now. Because we're just the same. Same lonely and sad teenagers.

" no wonder her friend Ymir left this school." Hitch glares at me. " it was because of her" that the last sentence shot me like an arrow that hits the bullseye.

" shut up" my voice stuttered. I clenched my hand so hard that it hurts. " she didn't do anything." My breathing went shallow. " she didn't do anything." I repeated in a bold voice.

" This is you versus the whole school, Eren..." Jean finally says. " who are you going to believe, huh? Me who spent so many years here in this school with Queen Bee herself or you who just met her and don't know anything that happened in the past?"

" admit it!" Hitch barks again. " you don't know anything!"

At this point, my brain didn't work properly. My heart was racing that I couldn't answer. I am speechless. My mouth was shut. My mouth was zipped and I don't know what I'm going to do. And I felt like I was going to cry but I can't. I don't want them to know. I don't want them to know that I was weak. I was a brat. " no.." I whispered as I shook my head. " stop talking to her like that..."

" speaking of the devil." Hitch spats out.

And at this point, I knew something was wrong. They stood there with their eyes looking at me. When I looked at it a bit longer, I realized those eyes were not darting at me. It was someone right behind me.

I slowly turn around and saw her right there. Historia was standing still, looking at us as if she saw something horrible. I think she heard it all. The words that they've been spatting out with her open ears.

She breathes as she gritted her teeth trying not to cry right in front of us. She shakes her head, looking down as I saw her tears dropping down one by one. She couldn't stand it. She couldn't handle it. She turns around and started running to the distance.

" Historia!" I called her name as my head suddenly snapped into a realization that I called her name out loud. Straight to their ears. " Historia wait!" And I started running following her behind.

My heart was beating. I suddenly got my nerves. I don't know if I was supposed to be scared but right now I'm terrified. I don't know if I'm terrified of what Historia will say to me or I'm terrified that she'll to ignore me after all of that happened.

I kept on running right behind her as she turns around the building until I saw her getting inside of the car, slamming the door shut as hard as she could, and started crying inside. I slow myself a bit and stopped right in front of the door.

I panted for air as I put my hand on the glass window. I don't really think opening the door was the right thing to do. So I slowly sat down on the ground, turning around so that my back leans to the vehicle. I let her cry. I let all the space for her to let out her tears if she needed to. I knew she needed it. She needs to cry to let out her real emotion.

Why would she appear in the middle of the day? I started thinking. Why would she appear when the class hours are still going on? Her school bag was also with her. Does that mean she tried to escape? To escape from this misery?

I felt a slight vibration on my back as I noticed the window slowly slides down. " Come here, Eren..." she says in a broken voice.

Without any answer at all, I stood up went over to the other side as I sat right beside the drivers' seat. When I was about to close the door, I felt her palm on my cheek as she leans in into a kiss.

She holds my head as I kissed her back. I put my hand on the side of her cheek, trying to wipe those tears with my thumb. " I know you have a lot of questions right now." She whispers as we parted away.

I looked into her eyes. It was glassy like the frozen ocean that I almost see my own reflection in it. " they were wrong..." whispered back. " I knew they were wrong."

She blinks slowly as she smiled.

" you were there." I paused as I hold her hand. "Why?"

" I was about to go home." She says simply. " but I just ended up hearing these voices and it revealed it was you and the others..." she looks straightforward towards the windshield " they have a point..." she looks down holding her hands tighter. " but I'm not the one who started it." She glanced at me. " Reiner did." She pauses. " Reiner started it all. And I'm such a fool for falling in love with him. Because of him, I'm included in this horse shit."

" and now I'm in trouble right now," She says, hugging her knees together.

Then the sky went dark. It started raining. It went dark. It went cloudy and misty. The feather flocks of clouds were gloomy as it covers the blue ocean sky. The pitter-patters of rain felt like rocks falling from above. It was so loud against the roof of the vehicle that I almost couldn't hear my own voice.

" you're not going to believe it." She continues as she looks at me.

"I'm not going to believe what?"

" That they kicked me out of the school." She says

" what?" My chest jumped. " w-what h-how? I mean Historia why did they—"

" they're just sick of me, that's all..." she raises her shoulders.

And I'm nervous and anxious about her " what happened?"

She sighs. A heavy sigh. " It happened so fast." She pauses, looking outside. " I confessed to the principal." She looks at me closely. " if I tell you this I think you'll going to hate me forever..." as she said it further, her voice gets softer and softer.

I'm getting anxious that my chest feels heavier. Something was off. I think something went wrong.

" remember the picture? With Mikasa?" She says. " I'm the one who did that."

What?

I blinked. Trying to figure out what she really means. That was her mistake? But why? Why does she have to do that? Does she have plans? Why did she confess? Why does she have to do that?

" I confessed and they decided to expel me from this school and call my dad." She says. " but before they do that, I escaped from the office."

" they expelled you right away with that first act of yours?—"

" This isn't the first time, Eren..." she glances at me. " I've done things wrong before..."

My head was spinning.

" I mean... there are no secrets anymore." she whispers avoiding her eyes at me. " but it doesn't mean that I'm a bad person..."

I have a lot of questions in my mind. I don't know if I should say it out loud. I thought I knew her. She was just the mysterious girl.

" that's why people hate me. They spread rumors that are not even true. I've heard those words years after years and I just want to escape from this school. I hate people. I hate them." She breathes shakily as if she was about to cry. " do you hate me, Eren?" She says in a soft and weak voice.

" no..." I said it immediately. " I don't hate you, Historia." I grab her hand as I felt her eyes looking straightforward at me. " at least you didn't lie, right?"

" what?" She chuckles as she wiped little tears at the corner of her eyes. " Eren seriously—"

" I'm not," I said teasingly. " High school's suffocating anyway. With this shitload of people around to judge you."

She breaks it with a soft laugh as I saw her sadness slowly fading away. " Look I have planned for this, okey? I've planned to escape this town by myself. So I guess you're here now too huh."

" Look. If you're trying to escape I'll come with you." I said it. And I mean it. " where there's just the two of us."

She looked at me. Her eyes were steady. She blinked many two times as the silence was embracing us. It's not the awkward silence that we usually feel but it was something warm, fuzzy, and peaceful. She smiles as she started the engine. The engine roars as it went alive. She put her hands on the wheel as she softly says.

" I love you..."

End of arc one  
To be continued...  
December 26, 2019  
Song: Strangers R3hab remix by Sigrid


	12. I'll watch you sleep

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Warning: NSFW

Historia POV

It became hot. Everything felt so hot.

I was towering over him. Kissing him at the side of his neck as I felt his hands roaming around to my hips down to my thighs. Electricity shocks me down to my spine every time he lays his fingertips on me.

I leaned back for a second so I could see his face. His emerald blue eyes were focused on me, his messy hair, his forehead was full of beads of sweat, his lips were pinkish from kissing. My heart suddenly jumped when I realized how attractive he was.

I panted as I slowly unbuttoning up his top shirt.

" god—" Eren says breathlessly. " are you sure about this, Historia?" He slowly sits up as I felt his hands at my back, guiding me to sit on his.

" yeah yeah," I whispered, " it's fine." Before he could even answer, I hold his head as I leaned forward. Closing my eyes as I felt our tongues collide. My heart beats faster than normal, making my chest feel heavier and heavier. Goosebumps along to my arms and nerves at every contact and every move.

His hands met up to my shoulder, slowly sliding down my shirt to expose my shoulder. He breaks the kiss leaving me breathlessly. I swallowed some air until a shock of the nerve was felt when his lips touched my neck, giving small kisses down to the base of my neck, to my collarbone, to my shoulders.

" mmgh—just unbuckle your b-belts already..." I stuttered. My head was full of air.

Without any word, he goes for his belt. He moves it quickly as if he couldn't handle the pain from how tight he was down there. I unbuttoned the button, pushing down his jeans.

" should I-uhm you know to—"

I looked up to him as I shrugged my shoulders. " D-don't make me wait, dumbass!" My face starts to heat up after hearing what I just said. " I-I d-don't know what I'm doing" I can't speak properly.

I saw his face slowly turning red as a cherry. I could literally feel his nerves from his arms. It was shaking as if it was getting colder. But all I could feel was burning in fire. I could feel my sweat sliding down to my back, to my neck, and even in between my chest. I pushed back my hair as I took off my top shirt.

Without even a word, I heard was the rustling of cloth until I get to realize that Eren's top was off, leaving his bare chest right into my eyes. I went closer to him as I let my fingertips touch his chest. " you're this skinny, huh?" I asked.

" not because of the instant noodles I swear." He says.

I planted several kisses, unbuttoning my jeans, taking them down to my thighs until his hand helped me take it off completely from my legs. I stole his gaze. He was panting heavily as well as I am. I kept my eyes on him as I unclip my bra on the back, leaning closer to him until our foreheads touched each other.

He put his hands on my buttocks, slowly putting them inside my underwear. Slipping it down. I never felt this nervous before. I slip off my bra strap down to my elbows as he sits up straight, leaning his back on the door of the vehicle.

But then, there is a sudden knock on the window. I looked up as I saw a police officer looking straight at me. " Oh, shit—" I immediately throw myself backward, grabbing my shirt to cover by myself. " Eren open the window—"

" W-what?" Without waiting for my answer, he looked behind him and saw the disappointing face of the police. Eren pressed the button as the window is slowly sliding down.

" No fucking in a fucking highway!" And there the police shouted with his spit sprinkled to Eren's face.

" I-uhm so sorry—"

" and this is illegal parking! You have two offenses now, sir." He says with a rusty voice, taking out his small notepad and starts to write things down. " what's your name?"

" David—uhm Jacobs."

He moves his eyes. He pressed his eyebrows together as he clears his throat. " You know it's in the afternoon, right?"

" yes sir."

" you know whatever you two were doing..." The last two words, shifted his eyes meeting mine. " you're on the side of the road—"

" y-yes, sir."

" and on a freaking highway." He points his pen at us with his other hand at the back of his hips. I was just there, literally on the floor. My bra strap fells over to my shoulders as I fixed them back up where it was supposed to be. The police officer's eyes were darting at me as if it was a hungry dog looking at me. I sudden discomfort strikes me. Disgusting. I want him to disappear right in front of me.

Eren moves at the side blocking me away from the officer. The officer steps backward then looks back to him. " aren't you two too young to drive? You're supposed to be in school."

My mind snapped. Fuck.

" where's your driver's license?"

Eren slowly turns his head to look at me. I honestly don't know what to do. I stared back at him as if I'm trying to tell him to do something. Something that we'll escape from this guy. I blinked as I noticed there is something in his eyes. He was slightly smiling and those eyes telling me that I don't have to worry. He had a plan.

Eren moves over to the driver's seat as the police officer followed him to the next window, watching him very carefully. Eren opens the drawer below the wheel and rustles something things inside. It was just full of wrappers and some crumbled papers.

" what's taking so long?" The police demanded.

In a swift motion, Eren gets the key from the drawer, starts the engine, moves the maneuver gear, stamps on the gas pedal. " See ya later..." Eren says in a cheeky smile and there the vehicle zooms off to the road.

I almost fell over from my seat. I stumbled forward as if we were racing with the wind. My chest feels like air. That heavy stone inside was now gone. I suddenly felt like I was running with the wolves. Away from anyone. Far far away from the people that I hated the most. I couldn't help myself to tear up a bit and having a laugh out of my lungs. " god–Eren that was—" I run my hand through my messy golden hair. " I can't believe that happened—"

Eren chuckled as he opens the window on his side, sticking his middle finger out as if he was hoping the officer could see it in the distance. In breathless laughter, I opened the window putting my head out as I looked behind us. My strands of hair were dancing it felt like I am free from the clouds.

" WHOOO!!" I screamed at the top of my lungs, closing my eyes feeling the breeze.

The bird has finally escaped from the cage. It'll fly high. The bird is finally free.

~~~~~

" Good morning" The guidance counselor smiles in a gentle voice. " please introduce yourself, darling..." her voice keeps reminding me of my own mother.

My name is Historia Reiss. 9 years old. I'm from Pinewood Meadow Ranch. 12 hours of travel from the city. My mother was a dressmaker. She always makes dresses in different colors and different styles. It may be patterned in flowers, mountains, and trees. Or maybe the stars and the moon. She always makes one for me. And since then, I started to love wearing such beautiful handmade dresses made by my mom.

I have an older sister. Her name was Frieda. We would always play together at the meadow. Sometimes, we would play at the river bank. There are also times that she was busy. She was a ballerina. She always performs at the plaza where there are violins, flutes, trumpets, or I'll just say that there's the whole orchestra playing along with my sister's flows on her body. I always thought that she was like a fairy. And I thought I want to become like her too.

I wanted to say all of those things. But I'm terrified. My hands were slightly shaking. My knees suddenly hurt as if I was about to tear up in front of the guidance counselor. This anxiety attacks me every time. My mouth remained shut.

" oh I'm so sorry, ma'am" My father's hands landed on my shoulders. Tapping it. " she's a bit shy." Then, he moves his head closer to my ear and whispers. " Hurry up. Speak up." It was just in a soft voice but it was strong and bold that those words nailed on my head.

" aren't you look pretty, young lady."

Those soft words made me look up to her. She was smiling. Her eyes were shining as if it was telling me that everything's fine. Her smile was warm like those warm breakfast that my mom usually prepare in the early mornings. " You look like you belong to one of those enchanted creatures in the forest." She says. " like those fairy bees roaming around with so many beautiful flowers." She put out her hand over the desk, offering me to let my hand, hold her. And I did, I think I trusted her.

She holds my hand very gently, rubbing my knuckles as if she was holding an infant in front of her. " at the same time, you look like a queen. A beautiful queen. Where the waves of the sea will be your gown. The crown on your head will be the stars and the moon. I think that's what a queen looks at you"

I put a smile on my face.

"hmm, Queen Bee. Your name will be Queen Bee, is that alright?" She says. " it's okey if you don't want to say your real name. I know what exactly you're feeling right now. It's okey. Everyone is nice at this school. And I believe you'll make a lot of friends."

For the first time in my life, I think someone understood me.

" I'll have someone to accompany you for you today." She says as the door behind us opens. I gazed back to see who it was. The nerves went up again.

It was a girl. She was taller than me. Tanned-skin, freckled face, has messy dark brown hair that reaches down below her ear. Her hazel eyes were looking at me. They were beaming as if she was excited to meet me for the first time like a dog who waited for its owner to finally come home.

" Nice to meet you!" She says in a joyful tone.

" she'll be touring you around." The guidance counselor just said.

" r-right n-now?" I stuttered. Without even answering the girl puts her hand over my shoulders, guiding me to stand up from my seat. "D-dad?" I looked at my father. " I-I w-want to go home..."

" it's going to be okey." He holds my hand. " this is for your own good, remember?"

I don't know if I should cry or panic at that time. My body was still as if I don't want to move somewhere. I just want to stay in this office and be with my father. I've never been this far from my mother and from my sister. All that I have in my mind right now was them. I badly want to see them now.

The girl holds my wrist that I gazed up looking at her. Her smile was so bright it almost hurts my eyes. I panicked. My chest feels hard like I was drowning. My eyes were hurting. My eyes then start to get wet.

" My name is Ymir." She says and sounds like she's about like my age. " I like to be friends with you. What's your name?"

What's my name?

I didn't respond. I stared at her. I blinked as I look back to the guidance counselor, asking for help. I couldn't let my words out of my mouth. My head was heating, my heart was racing.

By the time I looked at the counselor, she smiles. A motherly figure smile. It was like my mom was just right there, watching me. From there, I know exactly what she was trying to say.

" Q-Queen B-Bee," I said it like an airless whisper. " My name is Queen Bee."

Who would thought starting from that day would change my life to an endless abyss.

Not until I met him.

" do you know about the new guy?" Ymir asks when we were finally in high school.

" what new guy?" I asked

She says picking up her french fries and starts eating them. She points her eyes behind me as I looked back. I saw him. He was alone sitting by the tree.

"What about him?"

~~~~~

It was already night time. Eren was in the driver's seat, taking a long ride on the road. I was just laying down on the back, looking at him. His strong and defined jawline. His tanned skin, kissed by the daylight. I love the way eyes shine through the streetlights every time we pass by. It almost looks like a gem.

The lights were dancing for a very short time. Then one beam came. And for the other one. His lips were parted. They were relaxed. They were pale but not too pale but I think it was a perfect fit when those lips met on mine. Whenever I look at it, it made me feel fuzzy on the inside. My cheeks hurt from smiling that I just couldn't let my eyes off of him.

" We can stop by the stopover for a while." I suggested. " and we can continue the ride by tomorrow morning."

" no no it's fine," he says, not taking his hands off the wheel. " where are we going exactly?"

I let out a soft chuckle. I couldn't believe he asked that question when the time we were literally driving for hours and hours and many kilometers away from school. It just like it popped out in nowhere.

" To home," I answered simply.

" Alright..." he speeds up as he moves his gear. " we'll be there in no time."

" Eren, please. Let's sleep for a while."

Eren looked at me by the rear-view mirror. He blinked. " Historia... it's okey. You can sleep." He says in a gentle voice. His low voice was smooth that it was like a spell. A spell that would make me in a very deep sleep.

I buried myself under the blanket. Resting my head literally on the cushion of the backseat. I could hear the silent moving engine and the wheels moving forward. I never felt this feeling before. As if Eren was my guardian. I never felt this way from my dad before. I never felt this feeling of away from people, away from problems, away from my enemies.

It's just me and him. Just the two of us together. On a ride to freedom waiting for me. I'd cry. I'm literally crying.

" Historia? Are you crying?" Eren said as he paused the vehicle for a while.

" no no.." I laughed between my lines " I'm fine just ignore me..."

To be continued...  
January 22, 2020  
Song: watch you sleep by girl in red


	13. I would rather see the world through the eyes of a child

It was Saturday afternoon. I heard the sounds of a sewing machine from the distance. I was running through the wooden floor, the sounds of my small feet onto the ground. I saw my mom, making a dress again. Making it piece by piece.

The sun is about to set and my mom was still working on her job. She doesn't stop and I started to feel worried about maybe she push herself all the way off. " Mom?" I called her as I went beside her, letting my hands rested on her lap.

" oh sweetie..." she stops the sewing machine and turns on the side, facing me. Her warm hands touched my cheek giving me a quick kiss on my nose, on my forehead then on my chin. I laughed at how funny she does that. " I just finished making your dress."

" my dress?" I asked

" yes, your dress." She smiles. A warm smile. " why won't you try this on, yeah?" She removes the cloth from the sewing machine. She holds it up, showing it at me. It was pink with roses and pink dandelions at the bottom of the dress. It looks soft like I was riding a cloud in the sky.

I put it down as I looked at the mirror. I touched every detail with my fingertips. How every thread was sown on this piece. With spiral patterns and teardrops shaped patches were placed in a certain way. Mom fixes my hair by pushing it back to my shoulders. " oh look at you." She smiles as she looks at me in the mirror. " you look like a princess."

When I was a child, I always believe that I live in a castle where my wardrobe was full of dresses that my mom would always make on Saturday mornings. I always thought that the world was peaceful and quiet. In the cabin, it was just the three of us. My mom, my sister, and myself. And I thought that was enough for me. As long as I am with them, I feel safe and I feel at home.

" Mom says you have to taste the droplets." My sister says as she held the small red flower. She puts the stem out of it.

" what? Is that true?" I asked not even believing her.

" Yeah. She says the fairies will guide you if you tasted at least one rain droplet from a flower." She gave me the broken stem with small droplets on it. " try it"

And I did. The taste plays on my tongue. There were parts that were sweet. Some of the parts were bitter. " ugh gross" I wiped my mouth with my forearm.

My sister laughs as she opens her arms. " come here!" She buried me with her arms, embracing me very tightly that I almost couldn't move my body. Our laughter spreads towards the whole meadow as she gives me endless kisses on my cheek.

" hey stop—" I tried to push her face away from me. I just ended up being tickled. " s-stop" it broke in endless laughter.

" I'm going to miss you, alright," my sister says, backing up. She cups my cheeks and looks at me with those eyes whenever she will leave from home.

" do you really have to go?" I asked.

Before she could even answer, she lets out a heavy cough. " Yes Historia..." she answers.  
" I have to practice ballet for you and for mom, alright?" She runs her fingers through my hair. " I'll do my very best for this contest, alright?"

My sister always loves ballet when she was a child. She always dreams to become one. And here we are, she succeeded in her dream. She works hard for it. She felt happy about it. My mom always supported her. Every contest she makes on every region, she would always put out all of her strengths. For us. For me and for my mom. She always said that. She would always do that. And I become more concerned because she doesn't have time for rest. I just think that she'll be fine. After all, I know she can overpass it.

" Just look at the stars when I'm gone, alright?" She says. "as I've always told you."

I nod as I embraced her tightly. Digging my face to her hair that smells like lavender and roses. It always feels like I was punched in the chest whenever she's leaving. Maybe I'm just afraid that maybe at some point, she'll never going to be back home. I knew my sister would never do that. I trusted her. I always would.

" I want to become like you, sis," I said when I back away. Keeping my smile as big as the moon.

Her limbs start to shake. " of course..." I still don't know why she started crying at that time. She cups my cheek. " of course you will." She says in a shaky voice and hugs me very tightly. " I love you..."

From that day, I felt something different.

" Historia we have to go." My father says as he picks up several luggage to be put in the carriage.

My sister just left a few hours ago and I'm here in my home with my mom. But on a strange occasion, my father was there waiting for me.

Waiting for what?

" Mom, why is dad here?" I asked as I looked at her. It was strange. She kept her eyes on the ground. Her hands were clasped together. They were stoned. They were tensed as if she was afraid to move or to speak in front of my dad. " mom?" I called her once again.

This time, she looked at me but there are tears in the corner of her eyes. She touched my cheek. Her hands were gentle, they were always warm and mild. She gives me a small smile as she kisses my forehead. " your dad is taking you somewhere." Her voice was broken as if she kept crying for hours without me knowing it.

" taking where?" I asked.

" to someplace better."

I was just a child back then. I couldn't understand those words. I was just a fawn, who always follow the doe. I still couldn't understand how the world works. I always look up to mom. The woman who I always love.

" Let's go, darling." My father takes my hand to go with him towards the door. Before we could even leave, I could hear my mom's words from afar. They were not exactly words but I knew what she was trying to say. She doesn't want me to leave.

She was crying. She holds herself tightly as if she was going to fall at the edge of the cliff.

And I'm just a child back then. I couldn't understand anything.

~~~~~

I've spent 8 years not knowing what is my purpose of being away from them. I have started a new life but everything that surrounds me was nothing like the place where I was born. There are so many faces of people that I don't recognize. I may met some of them. They were nice that I made a circle of friends. For the first time, I've been outside. And I just realized to this day, my mom doesn't want me to go outside the barn as if the walls and the animals we've owned were the only things that matter to me.

I don't have friends back then. But to this day, I am still wondering why mom cried when the time I left them 8 years ago.

" who are you checking at?" Ymir nudges my arm with her smirk sticking to her face.

I blinked several times as I noticed that I have been staring to space for several seconds. " oh" I let out a soft laugh. " it was nothing..." I looked down at my own plate that I never touched.

" God, Queen Bee." Hitch says with a sarcastic tone. " don't tell me you've been checking that Reiner guy over there."

I suddenly looked up to her when I heard a name. She gives me a cheeky smile and I was so confused about it. She points her eyes as I followed her. I saw him by the counter with several Jocks. I don't really know him. Others said that he's that popular guy at school.

Since then, our friendship became bigger. There's a light in me that shines so bright that I was able to work on my own. Because of them, my anxiety lessens a bit. They helped me climbed onto a mountain. And I was so grateful for having them.

~~~~~

It was pretty late to walk at night. It was currently 2:30 am. Those nights I've been spending was from the cheerleading dances for the finals. I've been practicing for almost a week. I really worked hard for it. Well, for school anyway.

Those nights, I keep ending up in the convenience store. Getting stuff so that I'll not die from starving. My sleeping hours are getting worst now.

In a strange time and event, my dad asked me to buy one bottle of liquor. I didn't ask why but the tone of his voice seems strange. It was the sound of a hungry wolf that looks for cravings. I didn't deny it. I went back to the convenience store even though I am literally wearing my oversized white t-shirt and having a messy bun. I was going to sleep but dad interrupts me.

When I came back home with the liquor he asked me to, the living area was suddenly turned into a mess. As if a storm came in and destroyed the area. The vases were shattered. The things were all over the place. There are shattered glass and picture frames. The chairs were fallen. Everything is fallen.

" What happened...?" I crooked over the darkness until I saw my dad at the corner like a stray dog. " I just left," I said in a bold voice. " what the hell happened here?"

" give me the liquor—"

" What the hell is going on?" I ignored his voice. " I noticed for the past weeks alright. You've been drinking alcohol for like every day. You've gone thin, your eyes-bags were swollen. You look like a fucking—"

" your sister." He says in a soft yet strong voice. " she's dead"

The world suddenly stopped.

"W-What?"

" I'm so sorry, Historia..." He crawls towards my foot, reaching it. " I did everything I could."

My hands were shaking. My heart thumps and thumps nonstop. It damages my ribcage. My knees were weak as if I was going to fall into an endless pit. My head was hurting. I don't know what he was talking about. The words that were let out were like strangers. They were filled with air. The air becomes thick that I couldn't breathe. Something is pressing my chest and I couldn't let it go.

" She's been suffered from lung cancer for several months now. I-I don't want to tell you because I knew this will happened. I don't want you to feel down. I did what I can do—"

" you didn't tell me," I said.

The room went quiet.

My eyes start to hurt. It stings like a snakebite. My throat was sour and I'm going to throw up. My ran my free hand through my hair, gripping it tightly. I want to scream out of the shell. I want to scream in front of him but it feels like it all went out. It was all black and dark. I closed my eyes trying not to let the tears out of my eyes. But the harder I tried, the more it continues to flow down on the river.

" You didn't tell me." That is all I could say. " if you tell me sooner, I could just meet her for the last time—" my voice trembles the words were split up. I didn't think straight. It was all blurry, too foggy, too broken to say some words. "I-I h-hate you..." those words sting on my tongue.

For the last eight years of my life, I would always want to go home. For some reason, my father ignores that request. It was just a simple request, but somehow my own father couldn't do it as if he was trying to carry a heavy rock on his back.

It's too late now. A heart in me suddenly felt empty and hopeless.

I bit my lip so hard that it might bleed. My eyes were so heavy that might fall off the ground. My chest was hard as if someone was pressing against it until my insides were ruined. Am I mad? Am I mad at him? Or am I mad at myself?

My father was begging for mercy. He asks for forgiveness from me. He wanted to look at him in the eyes as if he was a child begging for peace.

I always believed in that. My home was a home for peace. I thought back then, my home was like a castle where there is a queen having two princesses. It feels like you're beside the river, hearing every movement of small waves from the riverbank. The sounds of leaves, the singing of creatures hiding behind the trees.

Now I thought, why do I have to leave, back then?

They already knew this is going to happen. Since when I was a child, my sister keeps hiding her truth about her condition. Is it because of me? Is it because I wasn't supposed to hear all of those things?

I was just a child back then and I couldn't understand how the world works.

I'm in pain. I'm in so much pain. In front of my eyes was misery. It was horrible that I don't want to exist. My sister was everything to me. She's important to me. She's the one I only got for myself. She's my protector like an angel who fell from the heavens.

For eight years, I kept daydreaming to met her again. Every single day I hoped I'll see her again. But that day my dad told me what happened, all of my hopes have disappeared in the wind.

My dad is a hypocrite. A secret keeper. A pretender.

If I stayed, this won't happen. Since that day, I would always think that I would always want to see the world through the eyes of a child.

To be continued...  
January 30, 2020  
Vid: through the eyes of a child by AURORA


	14. The girl on the bridge

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Warning: mentions of self-harm, suicide, and angst.

It felt cold when my skin touched the waters. Cold as the blocks of ice, floating all around me. It stings like sharp edges as it keeps on puncturing me to the nerves of my skin. I let the air out from my lungs, seeking a little warmth. But the harder I tried, the fire is gone into ashes.

I stared at the sky. So dark that I can jump to an endless hole. Glitters of stars, planets, and the moon driving, moving like the wind that the time is always running over and over again. My body is shivering to the bones. I couldn't breathe, someone was holding my neck, blocking the air that I wanted for days, for weeks, for months. My eyes were sore. Red as the rose petals fell over the field. Tears were endless that it fills the whole abyss.

So cold, so dark, I almost couldn't see anything. I am lost. Someone, please find me.

" Queen bee?"

I blinked several times before I realized that I was outside with my friends over the table. I was sweating. My eyes were on the ground. My throat was dry that I couldn't speak out words. My body feels so heavy that the gravity pulls me over the ground. I slowly looked up to her as if my eyes were like boulders.

" are you alright?" Ymir asks again.

I couldn't hear the words she tried to tell me. The words that had been spatting was unknown. I couldn't understand anything about it. I don't why people keep saying those things. I couldn't understand anything. I don't know anything. I don't know anything.

I was about to eat what is on my plate. I picked up my fork but I accidentally drop it on the floor. The tinging sound travels through my eardrums. It was so loud that it made me deaf. My heart keeps thumping that the eyes of every human were looking back at me. " I-I'm s-sorry—" My voice broke into tears. I cover my eyes with my palms, hiding my face on them.

" oh, Queen Bee..." I heard Hitch's voice as I suddenly felt body contact with me. She hugs me tightly as she rubs my back slowly. I leaned my head on her chest as tears of my own doesn't stop coming out. I don't why all of this happened. I don't know why I'm acting like this. I always needed an answer but the harder I tried it felt like it was nothing. Nothing like the air.

"God.." Ymir sighed. There, I felt her hands on my back, rubbing it up and down. " it's okey to cry. Come on it's okay. It's going to fine." She slowly removes my hands away from my face. My cheeks were wet, my eyes were ready to come off, my nose is blocked, and my whole body is hurting. My whole body is hurting me.

She wipes my cheeks with her palms. " hey hey look at me."

I looked into her hazel eyes. It was shining like honey-kissed from the sun. She smiles. A caring smile that I don't usually see on her. She always teases me. She always makes fun of me. The person right in front of me isn't really her. It was strange. Maybe...Ymir can be this Ymir.

" my f-father..." I choked at my own words. Looking at the ground, clasping my hands so tightly. My head suddenly aches. " m-my sister... I-I d-don't know what to d-do—"

"Sshh..." Ymir shushed me up, caressing my hair with her fingertips. " hold on please..." she whispered as she holds me tightly. I could feel her warmth against me, as if I was at the meadow, playing with my older sister once again.

Every time the days passed by, It made me so confused. I couldn't understand how the time works anymore. The time I went to school was Monday, but my Tuesdays become Wednesdays, and Thursdays become my Fridays. I felt like I was in a different dimension where I was at peace, where there is no people will look on to me.

As it went on, I don't know why my days went darker and darker.

" hey have you heard? Queen bee's a whore."

I was inside one of the stalls in the restroom. The eyes of the tiger, the eagle, and the beasts were looking at me. It scares me that they were about to eat me alive. In the first place, I don't really want to go to my class. Guess what I did? I hid for a while in this room.

" I bet her dad is a drug dealer. That's why she's rich. She can literally control everybody and anybody."

My heart stopped when they talked about my dad. I wanted to burst out of this room and scream at them. They were wrong. It's all wrong. But somehow, I was trapped. I couldn't move my body. I couldn't move my hands or my feet. I was sweating and I was crying silently. And I'm helpless.

This room was supposed to be me all alone. But I guess I was wrong after all.

" she dated a lot of guys, you know that? Ugh, I swear she's the worst. I hope she'll die and disappear to end her misery"

" This school is getting worse because of her and that gang that she was involved in. They've done so much to us. They've been hurting us! I don't why the school body itself doesn't open their eyes to that"

I am the enemy. They've been talking words about me as if I was the devil that lives in hell. I was the real monster I am the real beast. I knew all of those words already and they've been slicing me bits by bits. By the time I looked at the door in front of me, there were written vandalism. Some were carved with a knife, and some of them were written by a sharp pen.

" Queen Bee Kill yourself"

"Queen bee is a psychopath!!"

" Queen bee is a slut!"

The wound is getting deeper and deeper. It's been killing me. It is slowly killing me.

I don't know how long I've been staying in this isolated room. I was sitting by the toilet seat. Looking at my own feet on the ground, grasping tightly to my scalp with the hands of mine. I was shaking. I was shaking because of fear. And that fear was still unknown like a shadow.

Was it because of everyone from this school? Was it this room? Or was it myself all along?

For this long time, I wanted this feeling to stop. To stop crushing me. To stop destroying me. It's been killing me. It's been hurting me. I couldn't handle it anymore.

I slowly stood up and opened the door. It creaks the time I went outside. I was speechless to see the face in the mirror. It was my face. My eyes were red, bruises, and scratches on my arms from hurting myself. My hair was a mess that I've slept for almost the rest of my life. I hated it when I look at it. I'm a pale zombie girl who has been trapped for billions of years inside of this restroom.

Everything is cold inside of my chest. It's been so long since the last I felt the warm breeze.

The door suddenly opens. I almost jumped as I saw a very tall guy. He has strong-looking shoulders down to his arms. Dirty blonde hair, caramel yellow eyes were pining at me. He was panting as he leans his body on the doorframe awkwardly "Uhm hey?" His voice was deep.

" what are you doing here?" I whispered. I was surprised by how dry my throat and my lips were. It's like I've been walking in the desert for so long.

" fuck... I knew someone's in here." He runs his fingers through his hair " I've been hearing noises from here and I thought it was from a ghost or something."

That is technically me. I am a ghost.

" also that was supposed to be me the one who'll ask that." He says. " what are you doing here?"

" m-minding my own business," I said immediately.

" at 9 o'clock in the evening? That's totally normal." He crosses his arms as he said it sarcastically.

So I've been staying in the restroom for that long?

I don't know many minutes or maybe hours I've been standing in front of this guy. I don't know if I should say something or do something. So I hold myself tight and let the silence bare between us.

" Are you okey?" He asks gently, slowly walking towards me.

I'm not.

" I'm fine..." I said without looking at him. " I was about to go home and..." I looked up to him as I realized he was so close to me. I could feel his breathing as his eyes look so close to me.

" you must be Queen Bee, right?" He asks " should I take you home? You look so unwell today. I think it's pretty dangerous to walk outside alone—"

" no, it's okay." I refuse his offer. " I can do it myself."

" Are you sure?"

" yeah yeah..." I moved his arm to the side to make a way for myself to the exit. " I'll be going now," I said as I look back at him from the door. He was standing still with the look of his eyes. I couldn't understand what it was supposed to say. But somehow, I want him to say something. To stop me. To stop me from going.

But he didn't.

I smiled as I tightened my grip on the doorframe. " see you tomorrow..."

And that night, I went somewhere else other than home.

~~~~~

The wind was so cold. It was so late at night. Maybe 3:00 in the morning. My whole body was shivering from top to bottom. I could hear the howling of wind against my ears. Shouts of anger and regrets. I embraced myself so tightly as I stopped by the side of the bridge, looking at the dark waters below me.

It was been a habit of mine. Sneaking out of my bedroom and walk in the middle of the night. I couldn't sleep most of the nights. I never touched my bed or my pillow for so long. There have been voices in my head. So soft yet it feels so heavy inside of my chest.

Most of the time, I just ended up being inside of a convenience store. 5 minutes of walking from my dad's house.

I stepped on the railings as I gripped tightly on the sides. The wind is getting louder and louder to my ears. The air becomes thinker that it's getting harder and harder to breathe. My hands were shaking, my legs become weaker. Suddenly, I felt cold waters streaming down my cheeks. Sharp pikes, as my eyes were burning from the wind.

I don't how it all went up to this point. The school has been torture for me. Some would I say I was that popular girl. Some would say everyone looks up to me. But hearing those words doesn't fit me. It doesn't feel like my own self anymore.

Negative minds. Negative thoughts. That's the side that I've been suffering. It's hard to be labeled as the "popular girl". Everyone knows me. Everyone talks about me. Everyone looks at me and I hated it. I hated it so much that I wanted to disappear and never come back again.

People keep on shouting words, phrases, sentences that I didn't know. I thought my life would be much easier in this new school. But I guess I was born with a weak heart and a weak mind.

I know it's just words. But it feels like swords, stabbing me repeatedly nonstop. I wanted it to stop. To stop. To stop everything, everyone.

But it didn't.

I pulled myself up to the side of the bridge. I could hear the waves below me. It moves rapidly and quickly as if a giant wave was about to come right after me. I guided myself to step up once more, stepped on the other one until I was just standing over the railings. And that point of view, I could see some of the lights, sparkling from the distance.

There's an earthquake inside of my chest. There is this voice again, floating all around my head. Screaming so loudly that my head is ready to explode into smaller pieces. I closed my eyes tightly until there are no rays of light to be seen.

But then, there's this voice. It was soft yet was so different.

" I want to become like you, sis"

I snapped my eyes out.

"of course... of course, you will. I love you..."

My hands were trembling against the metal, remembering how gentle and smooth her voice was back then. The time she hugged me, the time she always looked after me, the time I always looked at her moves on her ballet, looking like a gorgeous swan over the enchanted lake.

I'll never forget how happy I was back then.

But now, somehow I couldn't remember how to feel that feeling anymore. You always look for it as if it was the only missing piece of me left. Someone stole it and didn't return it back.

I think this is the time that I have to let it go.

" Miss! Hey, stop!"

My chest jumped at that voice.

The sudden grasp of arms, wrapped around to my waist, pulls me off the railings. My body drops from the moon to the ground. " let me go!" I shouted at top of my lungs, struggling away from the arms of a stranger. " let me go! Please let me go!"

" miss hey hey look at me please look at me" His voice was rushed as he held me close.

When the time I looked at him, that is the first time I saw his face. A brunette so messy, wearing a seven-eleven uniform, with the eyes of a young man. I saw his name tag, pinned on his side

and his name was Eren Jaeger.

He kneels in front of me as he holds my hands very gently" miss please whatever you were trying to do, I won't let you go like that." He says like a train. " I know it's been tough for you but please..." he holds my hands so tightly, trembling from me. " please just don't..." he whispered.

My hands were cold as ice. So numb, so painful. By the time he holds me, I felt warmth for the first time in many years.

" I'm so t-tired..." I struggled to breathe as my eyes become water. " I'm so t-tired—"

He hugged me close as I rested my head on his shoulder. I could hear his heart so loud, so close to my ears. His chest was warm that the ice in me has finally melted away. " there are still things in this world to discover. No matter how hard these days has been, there's always a light waiting for you. And that light will be beautiful. But you have to seek for it, and look for it. And finally, you'll find that way. And I don't want you..." he hugs me even tighter as I hear his soft cries. " I don't want you to miss that."

My heart went weak. My body collapses. I hugged his back so tightly that I don't want to let go.

And I thought, he saved me. Eren saved my life.

To be continued....  
February 22, 2019  
Song: lucky by AURORA


	15. Hygge

"Let's talk for a while, shall we?" She says as she offers me a seat right in front of her desk. Her office is quite small. Shelves full of books, drawers full of papers, figurines, shining trophies, and pictures displayed right in front of my eyes.

The room was indeed quite small. This space reminds me of that suffocating space, my eyes staring out for how so long. Those voices, those whispers, those faces inside of my head. I clenched my fist inside of my pockets, trying so hard to control this unknown fear.

I looked at the guidance counselor as she caught my eye. She makes a smile on me and says " it's okey hun..." her voice was slow and steady that my heart paced with the smooth waters.

And so I did what I was supposed to do. I sat on the chair. Knees together, hands on the lap, straights my back, and my chest out. That's what every lady must do, right?

"One month is finally over and you know what that means..." she says while flipping some papers on her clipboard. " honey, how's your month this recently?"

Everyone was not nice to me, I was trapped in the restroom for hours. I heard rumors, I met a boy on the bridge, my dad was a prick, it's been torturing me—

" it's been great..." I answered as I shrugged my shoulders. " I've met a lot of people... I guess..." I looked at the ground, avoiding her contact with me.

" do you remember when your friend Ymir told you yesterday?" She asked as she caught my attention her.

"Ymir? I've never talked to her two weeks ago—"

" darling, the three of us were here at the exact same spot yesterday." She says " you talked a lot about Isabel. It's surprising because you've been enjoying almost every day meeting her. But base on my reports, I don't think you don't treat Isabel like a friend must do." She puts down the clipboard. " I want to clarify if you remember that."

I pressed my eyebrows together, my head starts to hurt thinking about it. Digging some answers, digging for questions, digging for a sequence of events. But it was blank. It was nothing.

" who even is Isabel?" I asked.

Something is wrong with me.

~~~~~

I could hear the birds flying above the clouds. The sun was warm when it touched my pale skin. The wind is cold through my nostrils. I closed my eyes as I remember every single piece of blissful memories. I could hear the children's laugher, the flowing waters on the river banks, the lake, and even the ocean. The sounds of rustling leaves from the bushes, numerous trees, and the meadow.

Oh, I missed that meadow.

" we're here..." I said as I slowly opened my eyes. Finally. I finally said it on my lips.

The view was breathtaking. The nostalgia was taking me.

The sun was golden. The field was filled with golden rays from the sun that is about to set. The meadow was waving with the warm breeze. I blinked several times to check I wasn't in a lucid dream.

The eagle makes a high pitch whistle, flew past above our head. It spreads its wings as it flew in the air as if it was the eagle's own territory. I could hear the song in my ears, the wind, the small animals, the distant sounds of people from the distance.

I'm home. I'm finally home.

On top of this small hill, I cupped my mouth as I sang melodies my mom used to make. My voice echoes through the hills. There are no exact words or phrases. It was just made out of tones coming from your voice. I let out high and low tones as if I was speaking with the spirits. I would always want to tell them.

That I'm here. I'm finally here.

" what the fuck was that?" Eren chuckles and stood there right beside me. " you sounded like a fairy or something..."

I smiled at his answer. " it's called Kulning. A nordic herding call for nature. My mom used to do that a lot when I was just a kid." I smiled as I looked over to the field. " god, I missed saying those words.."

" I'm glad to see that on your face..." he says as I turned my head to him.

"My face?" I questioned.

"Yeah... I've never seen you this kind of smile before. I never thought it would suit on you."

The wind blew our skin. His hair follows the wind. His green ocean eyes reflect with the orange sun. The rays licked his tanned skin that suits him very well. My chest raced the way he looked at me. I blinked as I noticed my face is getting warmer. "Is that so?" I chuckled.

He smirks. "What? Are you making me say it agai—whoa Histori—"

I pulled his arm to the ground. Our bodies rolled downwards over the field. And they're stopped right in the middle. I laughed. I laughed so hard that my stomach starts to ache.

By the time I looked above, the clouds have shades of pink and orange. It is moving very slowly following by the breeze. It is like what Leonardo da Vinci would paint on his canvas.

If I were a painter, I would paint my canvas in black. Maybe I would put some stars and moons on it.

" Hey..." Eren moves closer to me. Looking at me. He puts his hand on my cheek slowly caressing it with his thumb. " what are you thinking?"

If I were to make another painting, I would put some shades of the ocean, maybe a color of turquoise and jade. I would put some clouds on it, shades of pink and orange. Maybe the meadow with golden strokes of the brush.

If I were I a painter, I would paint him.

I leaned in. I kissed his lips. There are always these tingles inside of my chest, butterflies in my stomach. He kissed me back as he put his hand on my chin.

When we break each other apart, I pulled him into an embrace. A tight one. I rested my chin on his shoulder and said. " I was thinking what would it be if I didn't meet you.." I answered his previous question. This time, I back away to look into his eyes. I smiled. " this won't happen at all..."

"It happened Historia." He answered. " You're home. You're back. You're free." He puts the strand of my hair behind my ear. " Just look in front of you. I'm here. I'm here with you..."

I can't measure how grateful I am. It was my only childhood dream. And I kept on dreaming and dreaming for the rest of my life. My dream that I would be here. Here in the meadow. I never thought he was the reason why I'm here. He woke me up. He woke me to this dream.

I am not dreaming anymore. I've woke up to reality.

~~~~~

Eren POV unknown place and time.

"Can we talk for a little while?" The woman asked as she offers me a cup of coffee.

So I sat across her as I took a sip on the cup. The warmth of caffeine travels down to my stomach and that cold night from my skin slowly goes away.

I don't know why her eyes get me a little nervous. She looks at me closely as if she was about to say something important to me. "W-what is it, ma'am?" It feels like I was talking to some sort of policewoman doing an undercover investigation.

"It's all about Historia, dear..." she says very carefully.

I blinked. Is there something wrong with her? Historia was now in the bedroom. Sleeping comfortably, finally on a bed, unlike those previous nights. She usually sleeps in the backseat of that car we used for 12 hours of traveling to get here. It was worth it.

Because of that, I get a lot of time to know Historia even more. She told me her untold stories. Of how she's going through those pathways, how she met people, how she thinks in a certain way. And I fucking know that the person in front of me was the reason why Queen Bee exists.

Ms. Hange Zoe. The guidance counselor. The one who named Historia as Queen Bee.

" I promise it's not bad news, sweetheart." She says as she let her hand land on my arm, slowly caressing it. " Since you are the closest to Historia, I just wanted to let you know about her. From what I've been observing to her actions, her behavior, her body response."

I honestly don't know what she was talking about. Does that mean there is still one thing I didn't know about her?

I shook my head. " I d-don't understand..." I said.

" you may have encountered things like you thought Historia and Queen Bee is a different person." She continues. " like in separate ways. Because Historia acts so differently compared to Queen Bee. Maybe you have noticed some change of behavior to her..."

What? I locked my eyes with her. I don't know why I felt so nervous. It feels like someone was choking me. I scare me because all the things she said were true.

She holds my arm slightly tighter. " I'll explain to you deeper later, okay?" She says. " I'm not just a guidance counselor, Eren. I'm also a psychologist."

I could hear my own heartbeat on my head. I swallowed my own saliva.

"Historia has DID." She calmly says.

"What does that mean?" I asked.

She bit her lower lip as she let out a heavy sigh. " Eren..." this time, she holds my shaky hands. " she has Dissociative Identity Disorder..."

Huh?

To be continued...


	16. Daisy

I wanted to scream. I wanted to scream until my throat bursts into pieces. It was very late at night, probably 2:45 in the morning. And I'm here, inside of the car. Staring at the mirror right in front of me.

My nose was blocked from too many tears. My hands were numb from too much ache, slamming on the steering wheel damn too much.

For all this time, all I wanted was to plug my ears, locked my eyes, reset my head. There are so many things I need to think about, to say something, to do something. It was too much. It all came all of the sudden like a flash on the broken dam.

"I don't understand, Ms. Zoe" I said shaking my head.

"There's more than one that is controlling Historia's mind. It may sound a little complex but I promise you to explain it very carefully, alright hun?" her voice trembles as I felt his shaking nerves through the skin of her sweating palms. " Historia has two separate personalities." She continues. " Separate personalities, separate minds, and heart" She pauses, this time she looked straight into my eyes. "You probably already know..." she says caressing my hands. "Her name was Queen Bee."

This silence was heavy to breathe.

"Alternate days, alternate nights. They switch places. They switch turns." She continues. " there are times that Historia couldn't remember anything when Queen Bee is the one controlling her mind. Her case was extremely rare. I don't say this but... it was severe. I don't even think her own family even herself know about it."

"You're telling me..." My voice cracks. " that those rumors and those shitload stories about her were true?"

She looked at me as if she was about to burst into tears.

"All of it?" I repeated. " that she's a psycho, a whore? Basically what this Queen Bee persona does?" My heart runs with the high speed. " tell me!" I stood up that my chair fell off the ground. " just tell me..." voice went off, more tears were coming down.

She sniffs as she wipes her own tears. " I hate to say this." There, she looked up at me. " it's all true..." her voice trails off the road.

" where the fuck were you!?" I shouted. " where were you when she needed you?"

"Eren please-"

" do you even really know what she went through!? Do you even know she's been suffering this anonymous pain back in Uni!?"

" I failed." She says. " I failed to become her mother. I failed to be his guider. I failed to hear her, listen to her, look in her!" She stood up. " I failed at everything. Everything I do."

" Tell me! Just fucking tell me." It's crossing the line. "Is there any other way!? Another damn way!?"

She closed her eyes as her body started to shake.

" she could've just died," I said.

She opened her eyes and gazed upon me. "What?"

" For all your failures she almost died from that bridge."

"It was you?" She said with tears. "You knew it all along?"

I lit up a cigarette that I found in the drawer in front of my knees. Inhaled. This heat in my chest dries up my tears, covering my cheeks.

I don't know if meeting her was a coincidence. Historia was just a regular girl. With small dreams and small hopes. She took my hand and I took hers.

There was a daisy at the middle of the meadow. When the wind blows, the daisy went off from the soil. Its petals were still in place but the it flew in the sky, exploring the other side.

Historia was a daisy. A fragile one. But wouldn't it be nice if the daisy stayed with the soil? The wind was too strong. Howling, whispering.

My phone rang inside of the drawer. Picked it up as I noticed 99 missed calls from Zeke. It rang again and this time I answered.

"Eren? Hello is that you?"

" hey.." I answered as I let out the smoke from my mouth.

"Thank god you answered. You almost killed me looking for you. Are you alright? Where are you? You've been missing for three day-"

"I'm fine, Zeke.." I simply answered, tapping the cigarette stick with my index finger. " I know what I am doing. So please don't be so worried."

"Your mom came home, Eren..."

What?

"She's been so worried about you. Please come back home... she's been crying thinking about you all night, all day ... just please.."

Is this the time that I have to decide?

If I left the daisy, would it be fine? Would the daisy be fine when it left from its soil? She's the daisy at the middle of the field. A fragile one, the lonely one, a different one. She has a different soul, a different kind of human.

She may be just a regular simple girl with small hopes and small dreams. But this world isn't the right place for someone like her. So much cruelty, so hideous, it's haunting, almost unbearable to live on her own.

Daisies can't live without the sun. Daisies can't live without the air to breathe. Daisies can't live without the soil to stand on its own.

It may be planned or unplanned. I have decided my fate. My life. Our life. With these uncertain events, unpredictable series. I just can't wither away.

"Tell mom I'm fine." I said " Historia needed me. I can't leave her..."

~~~~~

I don't know how long I stayed in that car. The next thing I knew was the sun is already out in the sky, shining so brightly. A sudden knock on the window. I slowly opened my eyes, groaning at how my back hurts from this tangled sleeping posture I just made.

"Good morning!" Historia cheered at the other side. Her smile was so bright recently. Almost didn't recognize her but it suits her very well. And I'm just here and thought, she was really beautiful.

I opened the door, stood upright in front of her wrapped my arms on her back as I rested my head on her shoulder, smelling this pure scent.

"hey... what's wrong?" she says rubbing my back "did something happened?"

I backed up a little bit, seeing her eyes on me. so bright, so crystal blue, and I'm addicted to it. I offer her a smile. A small one as I caressed her cheek with my thumb, giving her a small kiss on her lips. "I love you...' I whispered.

Her face burned up. " T-that was unexpected," she says, stuttering as we hugged each other with this light silence.

" you smell like you smoked the whole box. Are you sure you're okey?" she says checking out my face.

"I'm fine..." I chuckled. A soft one.

" we're not done yet, so you better suit yourself up because you'll meet my family soon. Only 30 minutes of ride till you got there. Sounds fun, hmm?"

Ms. Zoe approached behind her, looking straight at me as if she was having a conversation only us can understand. She embraced her arms together, anxious. " I'll see you again soon, dear.." she puts her hand on Historia's shoulder like a mother she only knew. 

Historia hugged her. " Thank you..." she whispered. " Thank you for letting us stay..."

" you always have this pure soul, Historia.." Ms. Zoe, letting few strands of hair move at the side of her face. " anything for the both of you..." she says kissing her forehead.

" Do it for me..." Ms. Zoe says. " Historia needs special support. please... take care of her... for me... for her family... for her too...."

This is my duty. I already have the weights on my shoulders. Pressing me down to the ground. Every time Historia looked at me I thought everything was fine. Everything was blissful like running towards the shore, seeing the sea and the horizon from afar. Her eyes reminded me of the sky. So Blue so clear that the bird from the cage can fly so high almost unseen to our naked eyes.

But no one looked behind those eyes. People only thought she was the popular girl. She got all the money she wanted. She got all the companions she only trusted. She got all the good looks. But no one looked at her the way she really wanted. Behind those eyes, you can see the hurricane. So strong, So dark you almost can't see anything. It almost swallowed her whole.

" Let's go?" Historia offers me to ride.

And I've chosen her. I've chosen the world.

To be continued...  
June 2, 2020


	17. The Ugly Duckling

Golden shards flicker through the horizon. Soft whispers of breeze, honey clouds, and golden beams touched the farmland. The leaves on branches, bushes on the ground, and trees softly dances as I looked above the sky.

The pigment of soft colors was seen. There's blue, there's pink, red and orange. The sky spills out with thousands of colors.

I felt a small nudge on my arm. "hey..." she called me.

"hm..?"

"enjoying the sunset?" she asked as she joined to sit beside me, hugging her knees together.

I take one more glance to the skyline, watching the sun slowly disappears behind the mountains. "yeah..." I answered.

"It is magical isn't it?" she says grabbing my attention to her. "days can be shitty sometimes but" she looks beyond the distance. "without any single thought, any day can end beautiful..."

Her golden hair waves, her fingers fiddles on a strand of grass twirling it with her fingers. "Hanji would always say that to me." She says. " I was pretty shy like really really shy..." this time she looked at me. " really shy that I wasn't able to talk to anyone..." she scoffs. "  
No wonder she lends a hand to me through the way." she rested her chin above her knees. " until she vanished in thin air..." her voice broke at the last.

"do you hate her?" her eyes followed my voice. " for leaving you behind?"

She sighs as she processes her mind. "No.." she answers simply. " I just thought that some things were meant to happen." She pauses. " and no one can ever change that." she smiles. The smile that speaks a hundred of hidden meanings. "maybe... the existence of Queen Bee has to happen..."

I felt a strange feeling in my gut.

"in order to meet you..."

Our eyes met, looking at each other's glances. She smiles as she blinks as if I saw the most beautiful sunset in my life. She closes her eyes inching closer to mine. I touched her cheek with my hand as our space between us is getting closer and close-

"Sister!!" a child sounding voice was heard.

We jolted backward, moving my head to the other side to hide my embarrassment.

The young girl runs towards her big sister. Historia opened her arms " Florian! c'mere!" Florian jumps to her arms letting out the sweetest laugh. " Oh look at you..." Historia says hugging her close. "You're such a big girl!"

"oh thank goodness..." Mrs. Reiss came along, holding a plate with waffles and rolled lefse. " we almost missed the full sunset show..." she places down the plate on the table."

"you have a really nice backyard, Mrs. Reiss." I complimented.

She smiles at me " of course.." she proudly says as she sat on the wooden bench " for all the farm work I've done for so many years, I can now control how the plants live."

I chuckled "That's impressive..."

"Mom says she's a fairy!" Florian cheers

"you think so?" Historia answered. " does that mean we're also fairies then, hm?"

Sharing each other's laugh and smile. That playful talk. Just watching her do whatever she wants makes me put that smile on my face. She often scrunches her nose when she smiles, her eyes sparkled, the corners of her eyes crinkled, she has that smile that paints her face so brightly.

It was such euphoria. She was the most beautiful sight I've seen.

"you like my daughter." Mrs. Reiss softly says as I moved my eyes on her. She noticed my face. My face starts to heat up.

"oh, uhm.." My throat went dry "yeah..."

She turns her head, looking at the two of them. "Historia has grown so much." Her voice cracks. "The last time I saw her when she was so little." She looked down to her palms, blinking to ease the tears. " And there she came back home. The same little girl who I always look after. She still has that smile, her face matching like Frieda." She glances to me. "For all those years, I always thought that I'm still not good enough for my daughters." She pauses as she put her hand on my shoulder "Thank you." she says. " Thank you for taking care of her..."

My mind was full of different questions. I still can't comprehend my own thoughts from all that just happened. There are still questions that need to be answered. I was too afraid to tell somebody. I was afraid of what will happen to her. I was afraid of what will happen to us. Her future slowly upholds beyond. This not yet the end. The journey still continues. If anything happens, I'd be happy to give up my life.

"You've always been a great mother, Mrs. Reiss," I answered. "Even those tiny moments, it meant really big to her. Historia just can't stop talking about you..."

Her chest enlightens, giving me that small grin. Whispering the word thank you.

"When will buddy come back?" Florian asks

"buddy?"Historia asks. "who's buddy?"

"Florian has those imaginary friends..." Mrs. Reiss laughs

"I told you, Mom! he's real!"

"Oh, Florian..." Historia says, combing her younger sister's hair with her fingers. "Tell me more about him, hm?"

No one knows what will happen tomorrow. There is no need to risk. But this time, I can't ask those questions yet. This is not yet the perfect time. That time will come. Someday. Somehow.

~~~~~

"Buddy and I used to play together!" Florian says standing on the chair by the dining table. " You were there too sister!" she cheered.

"Are you sure?" Historia says, holding the chair where the young girl was standing. "Don't move too much you'll fall."

"When was the last time you saw buddy?" I asked letting my arms land on the table.

The nighttime falls. The dark skies were approaching outside. Went to the cozy place so-called home. Mrs. Reiss prepares for supper, cooking in her kitchen.

"well..." she thinks for a while. " I don't remember. Maybe a few years ago when I took ballet lessons. We would sneak out the lesson and play at the farm!"

"Wait that is true?" Mrs. Reiss appears around the corner. " I can't believe you skip out lessons..." she says while holding her ladle.

"I'm sorry mommy..." she says in a soft voice like a lone wolf.

"aw, that's okey..." Historia stands up from her seat as she cupped her younger sister's cheeks. "At least you had fun with buddy, right?"

"mm!" Florian nods with a cheerful tone.

There was a small knock on the door. It knocked trice. "Hun, can you please?" Mrs. Reiss says at the kitchen. Florian gets on her feet and ran towards the door.

"maybe I should follow her..." Historia says holding my hand once more as I gave her a smile before she left.

There was silence when the two left. Mrs. Reiss appears with the dish she prepared. "Uhm Mrs. Reiss..." I said.

"yes, hun?" she sets it on the table.

"Historia and I may have met in a school for quite some time now but somehow." My throat tightens. " I still would like to know more about her.." I take a glance.

She lets out a soft chuckle. "oh you sweet man..." she smiles. "It would be nice if you stay here a little longer." she says. "why? is there something bothering you?"

"No.." I answered. "I just thought that maybe there are still more things I need to discover."

She crosses her arms together as she looked at me very closely. She blinks and said, "She's the most mysterious girl, isn't she?"

Mysterious girl. What a word. She always has been. From the very start where we first met, up to this day. She changed a lot through those days. We've encountered too many people. Too many events that changed her the way she is right now. Her eyes opened for the first time. She stood up to fight. She may have those darkest days in her life but until then, she broke that boundary.

No one can view the world like how Historia sees the world. She is a mysterious one. Always. That is what makes her unique. She has a different soul and a different mind.

I think that is what makes her beautiful.

I stared at Mrs. Reiss. Thinking what she just said. Giving her a small grin because I knew, she knew, Historia was the mysterious girl from the very beginning.

"Buddy!" Florian cheers

I followed that voice. I went to the doorway as I saw Historia standing so still. Her body tensed, I could feel her trembling nerves. She couldn't speak like the world was so small she couldn't breathe. She blinks as if she couldn't believe what she just saw. When I looked further, there was a figure standing by the doorway.

No. It could be. This is wrong. This is all wrong.

"Reiner..."


End file.
